


Edge of Sorrow, Heart of Truth

by feliciacraft



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drama, F/F, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, POV Alternating, POV Multiple, Resurrection, Romance, Season/Series 05, Season/Series 06
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-27
Updated: 2017-02-24
Packaged: 2018-03-19 21:57:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 55,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3625725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feliciacraft/pseuds/feliciacraft
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Buffy leaps from Glory’s Tower to her death, but not before consummating her burgeoning relationship with Spike, unbeknown to others. What happens now that she’s dead?</p>
<p>A rewrite from the end of Season 5 to a more Spuffy-friendly Season 6, this resurrected Buffy will come back to a different group dynamic, face different challenges, and eventually, learn to love and fight again with a Scooby-accepted vampire lover by her side.</p>
<p>A continuation of my Season 5 <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/series/220769">trilogy of one-shots</a> set in the same universe, which sees Buffy and Spike embark on a romantic relationship.</p>
<p>  <img/><br/><b><a href="http://sunnydawards.dragonydreams.com/nominees.html">Nominated at Round 31 of the Sunnydale Memorial Awards</a> for:</b><br/><b>Best Unfinished Fic, Best Characterization, Best Drama, Best Plot, Best New Author</b><br/> </p>
<p>  <img/></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. All My Days Are Trances

**Author's Note:**

> Rating: NC-17 eventually.
> 
> Beta: SlayerDaniWho and (later) All4Spike. I can't thank you enough for all your help and encouragements!
> 
> Distribution: No posting elsewhere without express permission please. No translations por favor.
> 
> Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Set before the final tombstone scene of “The Gift” in Season 5. Without their Slayer, they can’t go on, they will go on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is taken from a poem by Edgar Allan Poe, quoted at the beginning of the chapter. Rated R.

**Chapter 1. All My Days Are Trances**

_Thou wast that all to me, love,_  
_For which my soul did pine—_  
_A green isle in the sea, love,_  
_A fountain and a shrine,_  
_All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers,_  
_And all the flowers were mine._  
  
_Ah, dream too bright to last!_  
_Ah, starry Hope! that didst arise_  
_But to be overcast!_  
_A voice from out the Future cries,_  
_“On! on!”—but o’er the Past_  
_(Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies_  
_Mute, motionless, aghast!_  
  
_For, alas! alas! with me_  
_The light of Life is o’er!_  
_No more—no more—no more—_  
_(Such language holds the solemn sea_  
_To the sands upon the shore)_  
_Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree,_  
_Or the stricken eagle soar!_

_And all my days are trances,_  
_And all my nightly dreams_  
_Are where thy grey eye glances,_  
_And where thy footstep gleams -_  
_In what ethereal dances,_  
_By what eternal streams._  
  
_\-- From “To One In Paradise”, by Edgar Allan Poe_

Spike came to with a full-body shudder and immediately regretted his state of consciousness. Vampire physiology rendered him immune to the elements, true, but some things still chilled him to the bone. Looking about to try to get his bearings, he realized he was fully clothed, a right mess sliding off of his favorite armchair, the one perfectly angled to watch both the telly and the front door. Judging by the soft light filtering through the window, it must’ve been close to sunset.

He tried to suss out what had happened. Mind a blank. Tried to get vertical. Legs wouldn’t cooperate. Felt the broken ribs, the punctured lung, and the busted knee then, among other souvenirs, courtesy of...Glory’s tower. _Oh, sodding buggering bleeding FUCK!_ A deluge of memories of the final battle poured forth from behind a broken dam, and the impact, unbraced, left him gasping for air, as if a man drowning. _Oh, Buffy…_ He had planned to go down fighting, lay down his unlife for _her_ , for little sis, except when had any of his plans gone any way but bollixed all to hell? _Couldn’t even dust right. And now--now, she’s-- Buffy’s--_

He shook his head in an attempt to unhook himself from that thought. Not going there; not yet. How long had he been out? He clearly hadn’t been feeding, or the mending pain would’ve long jolted him awake. Candles long gone out. Crypt smelled unlived in, undisturbed. Craning his neck, he noticed that the door had not been latched from the inside. _Huh. Did the Watcher man and Harris boy bring…?_

_Should’ve been touched, the Slayerettes taking care of Old Spike_ , he thought, with just a hint of bitterness. Would’ve too, had there been anything left where his heart should be. _Oh, Buffy…_ No circulation system to his name, yet he still suffered headaches--ain’t that a laugh. This one, by the pounding of it, was express delivery straight from hell.

He forced a leaden hand up to soothe his throbbing head and paused, when he caught, from his fingers, a whiff of _her_ , of their combined spendings, from...before. Gave that knife lodged right in his heart another turn. He was already Love’s bitch, did the Powers That Be really have to make him their punching bag, too? His eyes stung then, full of tears for her, for them, for the dream that almost was but would never be again and the nightmare of his reality. He had finally had her, hadn’t he, held her in his arms, in her bed, pliant and satisfied and so, so sweet. Smiles radiant and body overheated and heart hammering and passion burning--

But no more. How he was going to endure the rest of eternity in the darkness, after such a brief yet dazzling encounter with sunlight, he had no idea. His inner William chose that moment to rear his timid Victorian head and wax poetic over the impossible romanticism of it all and quote Tennyson-- _Tennyson, that wankstain!_ \--only to be shoved back where he belonged. Anyone who thought it _better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all_ did not truly love, not the way Spike did. And was a simpering pillock, a sodding poncy poof, a rat-arsed berk. He rattled off a few other choice words in English and for good measure, piled on more curses from a half dozen demon languages.

_Oh, Buffy…_ He kicked the coffee table, hard, in a bout of impotent rage, and set off a cacophony of bottles clashing to the crypt floor. He surveyed the damage: must’ve been a dozen JD bottles there, another piece of a clue to his lost time. A closer look revealed a half-full bottle. He plucked it out of obscurity and tipped the bottle over his eager mouth.

* * *

  
Willow gently pulled Dawn’s bedroom door closed behind her and tiptoed down the stairs to join an anxious Tara on the sofa.  
  
“How is she?”  
  
“Finally asleep. Your valerian and passion flower tea did the trick. Well,” Willow amended in a small voice, “I may have magicked it to boost its potency.”  
  
Tara reached for Willow’s fidgeting hands and covered them with her own. “She’s going through a rough patch. Picking out a burial outfit for Buffy was too much for her, but therapeutic in its own way. The crying was a form of release. Magic shouldn’t be necessary. Just give her time.”  
  
At Tara’s touch, Willow’s tense frame visibly relaxed. She laid her head on her girlfriend’s shoulder. “But it’s been a week, Tara. What if she doesn’t get better? What if the nightmares never go away? What if she still wouldn’t leave her room?”  
  
Tara smiled and put an arm around her. It was just like her Willow to want everyone happy. “Well, at least she’s no longer just staring into space, which is a definite improvement. My mom always said to trust in the healing power of Mother Earth. Gaia provides us with herbs like valerian, passion flower, and chamomile to ease anxiety, calm nerves, promote relaxation, and enhance the body’s innate capacity for self-preservation. It’s more reliable than magic and always benign, because its source of power comes from Nature. Other than that, we’ll love her and be there for her.”  
  
“But what if--”  
  
“Shhh. Let’s not borrow trouble.” She started gently rocking Willow, like a mother rocking a child in distress. “It took me a long time to stop crying every day after my mom passed away. And I didn’t have to deal with guilt. Dawn needs to grieve and come to terms with her emotions, and we need to let her.”  
  
Feeling Willow’s nod on her shoulder, she turned to her. With her eyes closed, Willow almost looked peaceful. But Tara needed to ask, because she knew, from experience, how much bottling up emotions hurt in the long run, how crucial it was to accept grief, live it, share it, and let it go. Willow was grieving clearer than if there were a neon sign declaring it above her head, but she was rejecting and hiding from it.  
  
“And how are you holding up?” Voice low and calming, Tara watched her girlfriend for a reaction.  
  
“Fine, I guess.” Off of Tara’s arched eyebrow, she reconsidered, turning to face her. “Not _fine_ fine, obviously, but okay, given...everything. It’s just that--” she sighed, then shook her head, “forget it.”  
  
Tara pushed Willow’s hair out of her face to look into her eyes. “Hey, it’s okay if you’re not ready to share. When you are, I want you to know that I’m here for you. Just to listen.”  
  
Willow bit her lower lip. “Okay. Do you ever think that if we were more powerful or--or knew the right spells, that maybe we could’ve saved Buffy?”  
  
_Ah, survivor’s guilt._ Tara gave her girlfriend a long look. Willow had said “we”, but Tara knew she blamed only herself.  
  
“More powerful...like an army? There was one, the Knights of Byzantium. They crumbled away in the presence of Glory, like clay figures in the rain. Or more spells, like those used by the monks?” She sent a glance in the direction of Dawn’s door, “They magicked millennia-old trans-dimensional energy into a flesh-and-blood human, with memories to match. That’s unheard of, Willow, but even they couldn’t hold off Glory.”  
  
Willow looked unconvinced, so Tara continued, trying hard to temper the wavering of her own voice, “Buffy was the first, the only one to defeat Glory. In the end, it wasn’t muscle or magic that counted--it was love.” Her voice was breaking, but she pushed on, undeterred. “It was Buffy’s love for Dawn, for this world, and for all the little anonymous people living in it.”  
  
Willow had started to sniffle and wipe at her eyes. She couldn’t look up, couldn’t face the sadness in Tara’s eyes, so like her own.  
  
“It was love for people like you and me, Willow, who could not have done what she did. Who can only remember, and live, and love.”  
  
Willow’s head jerked up at that. The last word was barely a whisper, but like a ray of sunshine piercing through fog, it penetrated through Willow’s gloom. “And love,” she parroted, leaning into Tara’s hand, which had reached up to wipe away her tears, and stayed to cup her face. She closed her eyes to concentrate on the warmth of Tara’s hand, but it was not enough, not nearly. So she threw herself into Tara’s waiting embrace, wrapping her arms around Tara’s waist like a little kid. She let her body go slack and her tears fall unchecked, the wetness seeping into Tara’s shirt to tickle her skin underneath.  
  
Holding up Willow, Tara’s own heart was breaking, the feeling painfully familiar. Death could never be anything but devastating, and they’d all seen so much of it on the Hellmouth. How much more could they take?

* * *

  
Giles let the pen slip out of his hand onto the notebook below and pinched the bridge of his nose. Detailing the death of his Slayer was undoubtedly the toughest part of his duty as a Watcher. That her passing should be unmourned by the world at large, which she died to preserve, seemed the worst injustice of it all.  
  
For nearly five years he had watched over Buffy, guided her in her sacred duty, honed her fighting techniques to the edge of her innate ability, stood by her through vampires, demons, a hell god, ex-boyfriends, a vampire ex-boyfriend turned soulless killer, a secret branch of the American military that experimented on demons, annual apocalypses and _good Lord, American high school_. He had even killed a human for her, because she couldn’t. And throughout it all--at first without realizing it--he had loved her and tried to protect her like the father she didn’t have, the father she desperately needed.  
  
In turn, she had challenged his and the Council’s authority from the beginning, pushed the boundary on recorded vampire lore and demonology, surpassed his highest expectation in serving the mission while living life to the fullest, and even managed to survive an earlier death to split the Slayer line. Not to mention her final act of self-sacrifice to save a dimensional Key of a sister, who had been nothing more than green energy a year ago. Perhaps most unusual of all, absolutely unprecedented, she had had not one, but two master vampires fall in love with her and turn to the Light, including a notorious unsouled vampire, William the Bloody, aka Spike.  
  
On that thought Giles reached for the bottle of Glenfiddich in the bottom drawer and poured himself two fingers’ worth. As a Watcher, this was the life he had chosen, since taking an oath to protect the world. His steel-forged courage in the face of the ever-present threat of death did not, however, offer him protection from heartache. The past week had been proof enough. Grief-stricken, he had, as Xander accused of him, “lost his cool” and come undone in the company of Buffy’s friends. He might’ve been uncharacteristically cold and uncaring towards Dawn as well, openly resenting her, perhaps undeservedly, for Buffy’s death.  
  
No doubt his subsequent absence at 1630 Revello Drive had been conspicuous, but he simply could not muster the requisite strength and courage to confront the painful reality of Buffy’s death. To enter her house now, without her. That Dawn, Buffy’s sister and the reason she gave her life, was in need of care and a guardian, he chose to ignore for the moment as well. He rather resented having to be the adult in Buffy’s inner circle and with all the responsibilities already heaped upon him, the one everybody expected to pick up the pieces. Every. Single. Time.  
  
Neither had he been by the Magic Box, the hat of enterprising proprietor never having particularly fit him, and seemed exceedingly ludicrous at the moment. Taking a long sip of his drink, he knew he needed not worry, for Anya would be there to handle the store front. And _because_ Anya would be there, he had no wish to present himself there as well. They were all witnesses to that unbearable crime, the one that ripped Buffy from her young life. In his mind, that made all of them accessories to murder, co-conspirators in her death. He simply did not know how to face any of them. Had death always hit him this hard? He thought back to the beginning of his career, of his stint as Ripper, those days marred with loss but always resilient. He was getting too old for this. He needed a caretaker, not _be_ one. He needed healing. He needed time.  
  
_There will be time, there will be time_  
_To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet_  
  
_Good Lord,_ he thought, _T.S. bloody Eliot. I_ am _getting old._  
  
In his head he replayed the obligatory phone call he had placed to the Council shortly after Buffy’s demise, mulled it over. To have to relive the worst day of his life to an unsympathetic Quentin Travers through the distortion of five thousand miles of telephone wires, and the fatigue of eight hours of time difference and zero hours of sleep, only to be met with the curt request for his post-mortem report on their last Slayer, stat, unleashed a fury in Giles he didn’t know he still had, so long after his Ripper days.  
  
“Her name,” he had said through gritted teeth, “was Buffy Summers. The Slayer title lives on. For Heaven’s sake, Quentin, show a little respect! A girl just gave her life so that you and I and six billion oblivious people may live!”  
  
“Precisely,” came the even-toned reply, and Giles thought he could detect a trace of boredom within, as if Travers were a schoolmaster repeating a well-rehearsed speech, and him a particularly dimwitted pupil. “Miss Summers did her _duty_. Her bravery is an example to us all. But pray tell, _Rupert,_ how are you carrying out _yours_ these days?”  
  
Giles was too busy counting off spells of a non-friendly nature that very moment, with that particular Council Director being his imaginary favored target, to come up with a retort.  
  
Travers, satisfied that he had restored the proper stoicism to their conference call with a well-applied measure of his stiff upper lip, continued with a subject of _his_ interest, “I wonder, with the Slayer line split, whether a new Slayer will be called? Or will that continuation fall to Miss Lehane?”  
  
Finding the suggestion of Faith’s death, so close to Buffy’s own, nauseatingly distasteful, Giles mumbled a safe wait-and-see-approach as his reply, and ended the phone call with the excuse of having last-minute details of Buffy’s funeral to arrange.  
  
“That insufferable, arrogant git!” Trying to shake off the memory of Travers’s smug voice, he took another draft from his glass, and returned to his diary, which, unfortunately, required him to consider the other loose end of his tenure in Sunnydale: Spike. That he had reformed, Buffy had been adamant. Giles was no fool. Well-trained in reading people and especially good at reading his Slayer, he could tell when her attitude towards Spike had taken a 180-degree turn. There was respect for the strength and prowess of a fellow warrior, admiration for his torture-tested loyalty, and trust--the kind with absolute conviction, wagered in life and death. There were times when he suspected that Buffy was beginning to reciprocate Spike’s feelings, consequences be damned. They paired splendidly in fighting, sought each other out in a group setting, either intentionally or subconsciously, and Council teaching or not, there was something poetic, in a yin-yang balance kind of way, about an alliance between the Slayer and the Slayer of Slayers.  
  
And what had they talked about during that brief reprieve on the Winnebago, just before the knights’ attack brought both of them rushing out from the back bedroom to jump into the fray? Not to mention, at the final battle, when they had returned from weapon retrieval at Buffy’s house, the way they looked at each other...  
  
Well, it was all moot now. Buffy was gone. That ended that, thank God. But it would be immensely irresponsible of him to leave Sunnydale without getting a clear picture of Spike’s intentions and plans going forward. Giles downed the rest of his drink. Bollocks. He was going to have to pay the chipped vampire a visit.

* * *

  
“Then I said, ‘You call this satin, but you know as well as me that this dress is made of second grade synthetic polyester and not premium Chinese silk, which makes the price you charge highway robbery--’ Xander Harris, have you heard a word I said?”  
  
“What?” Caught, Xander’s mind raced to come up with a reply that proved his attentiveness. “Synthetic silk? That’s uh, what exactly is synthetic silk?”  
  
Anya huffed. Men. Couldn’t even rely on them for good dinner conversation. How were you supposed to put up with one for life without either calling on a vengeance demon for backup or turning him into a troll yourself? It had done wonders for her career, sure, but now that she was newly human, it was hardly all puppies and sunshine.  
  
“Nevermind that.” She stabbed a pearl potato on her plate and waved her fork in Xander’s face. “You’re miles away. How could you not be emotionally invested in our wedding, and by extension, my wedding dress contestant number five?”  
  
“I’m invested. I’m the Warren Buffett-level investor. I’m--” having just processed everything, he puzzled over her last sentence. “You have contestants for your wedding dress?”  
  
“Sure!” she beamed, now that Xander was finally with the program. “Reality game shows are the new, hot American thing. Nowadays, it’s almost as American as consumerism. And I thought, why not do my patriotic part and combine the two? So I started running a competitive game show for the best wedding dress in my head. Simon Cowell is a judge. He never means to be rude, but he’s ruthlessly blunt and uncompromising.” She sighed longingly, “I owe him so much.”  
  
“An…” Xander rubbed his temples. He didn’t want an argument. The funeral was in two days. He had had a tough day on the job, foregoing his hour of lunch break in an effort to make schedule, and still landed himself on the manager’s shit list for requesting time off in the pre-summer construction crunch. In contrast, what occupied the thoughts of his girlfriend--scratch that, fiancée--seemed neither appropriate nor consequential, given... _everything._  
  
Not known for subtlety, he had no idea what to say to not hurt her feelings. He nudged a pearl potato to the side of his plate only to watch it roll back. The slice of steak he just swallowed--medium rare, cooked to perfection, just the way he liked--somehow did not go down easy. Well, at any rate, _something_ was lodged in his throat. He had no idea how to placate Anya, so he aimed for straightforward, “It seems hardly the time to be fussing over wedding details. Buffy’s funeral--”  
  
“Buffy’s funeral, Buffy’s funeral...is that the only thing you care about? She’s gone now, and still manages to pull your strings from beyond the grave!” She pushed her plate back and pouted all the way to the sofa, where she threw herself down, crossing her arms and legs in a battle stance.  
  
_Shit list? Meet doghouse._ Xander wanted to go to her, appease her with a mumbled apology followed by a heartfelt kiss, and engage her with a question about the tablecloth or centerpiece for the wedding reception. He didn’t give a damn about such things, but she did, and that was all that mattered. In turn, Anya would relent, and melt in his arms. She was quick to anger; but her temper, like showers in April, never lasted, and she wasn’t one to hold grudges. He loved that about her.  
  
She seemed to take his silence as a sign of tacit agreement. Her temper flared. “And I spent two hours cooking your favorite meal. Would it have killed you to pay me a compliment? _‘Way to a man’s heart is through his stomach’_ my ass.”  
  
“Where are you finding these 1950s housewives to take relationship advice from?” He knew it was the wrong thing to say before the words left his mouth, but he couldn’t stop himself. It was like watching a trainwreck about to happen in an out-of-body experience. He briefly considered if such a thing had happened in Sunnydale, literally.  
  
That did it. Anya shot up and came at him so fast he felt the rush of hot air before he saw her towering over his slouched form. “At least I’m trying!” her voice was breaking. _Not good._ “Being human is _hard!_ I’m learning, for you. For us.” She frantically gestured the space between them. “The least you could do is to not mock me!”  
  
He sprang into action then, and gathered her quaking body into his arms. “I’m sorry, An. I’m an idiot. Open mouth, insert foot--that’s me.” He pulled back to cradle her face between his palms, wiping at the streams of tears with his rough fingers, “Please don’t cry.”  
  
Anya dabbed her eyes with a tissue, but the tears wouldn’t let up. “I get it that you’re grieving for Buffy. I am, too. She was a sweet girl.” She hiccuped, her sobs easing as her fury turned to sorrow. She was genuinely upset, but seemed to draw strength from it. “But it just reminds me that human lifespan is so short! We need to live each day, and _enjoy_ it, as if it was our last!”  
  
They stood there for a long time, motionless except for an errant sob that escaped from Anya every once in a while, clutching each other tight, like two people drowning in a river of sadness. Silently, Xander blinked away what felt suspiciously like tears. He loved Anya, didn’t deserve her, and wanted to devote his life to her happiness. But Buffy’s passing had set up house in that dark corner of his mind, and he wondered if he’d ever be happy again.  
  
  
~ To Be Continued... ~  
  
A/N: Thanks for reading! Please let me know what you think by leaving me a review. I’m writing this for your entertainment only. Tell me I’m not shouting to an empty room. :) Your feedback helps me keep going and helps the story take shape!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. Alfred Lord Tennyson, if you’re unfamiliar, was one of the greatest English poets ever, and remains among the most popular to this day. Chances are, you recognized the quote in the story even before the attribution. A representative Victorian poet with a Romantic inclination, he would likely have been one of William's favorite poets.
> 
> 2\. The T. S. Eliot is a favorite of mine. A “learned man,” as Giles would appreciate, he studied philosophy, classics, and languages, among them Latin, Greek and French. His poetry, though absolutely brilliant with words, can be a bit heavy, bordering on esoteric, with a preoccupation for religious themes, such as sin and free will, damnation and salvation--the same themes explored by Buffy the Vampire Slayer, despite Joss being an atheist. The poem Giles quotes from, a favorite of mine, is [“The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”](http://genius.com/Ts-eliot-the-love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock-annotated).
> 
> 3\. This story is set in the same universe as my Season 5 prequel trilogy of one-shots. It may help with context and continuity, as it may explain a few things mentioned in the story summary, such as that new relationship between Buffy and Spike: 1. [“New Territory”](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3446960) (PG-13), 2. [“Cold Light of Day”](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3485084) (PG-13), and 3. [“Enough”](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3544100) (NC-17).


	2. Not in Old Heroic Traces

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We'll check in with the Scoobies as they continue to cope (each in their own way) with Buffy's death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rated R.
> 
> Watch out--Heavenly!Buffy makes an appearance! :) Title is taken from a poem by Emily Brontë, quoted at the beginning of the chapter. A shout-out to the meticulous SlayerDaniWho for beta-ing. Much obliged!
> 
> And a "thank you" to all my readers, especially the lovely people who have left me kudos or comments! Your encouragement keeps me writing for the Buffy fandom.

**Chapter 2. Not in Old Heroic Traces**

 

_I’ll walk, but not in old heroic traces,_  
_And not in paths of high morality,_  
_And not among the half-distinguished faces,_  
_The clouded forms of long-past history._

_I’ll walk where my own nature would be leading:_  
_It vexes me to choose another guide:_  
_Where the gray flocks in ferny glens are feeding;_  
_Where the wild wind blows on the mountain side._

_What have those lonely mountains worth revealing?_  
_More glory and more grief than I can tell:_  
_The earth that wakes one human heart to feeling_  
_Can centre both the worlds of Heaven and Hell._

_\-- From “Stanzas”, by Emily Brontë_

 

When he ran out of liquor in his crypt, even depleting his backup stash and his impending-apocalypse stash, a reasonable vampire might’ve said, “Enough is enough,” and moved onto the next stage of grief that did not involve attempts at alcohol poisoning. Spike, who ranked “reasonable” much like he did “mediocrity”--the most despicable condition in life and unlife--beat on heedlessly, back set deliberately against reason. Having never done anything by halfsies, he simply switched the drinking to Willy’s, his one-man pity party in tow.

“You’re not welcome here!” the snitch shrieked, right before bolting out the back door. Might’ve had something to do with the look of murder in Spike’s eyes, not to mention past history. No blood and no sleep except for bouts of passing out cold with nothing for company but bottles of Jack Daniels for how many days now. He smelled bad and looked worse--like a walking skeleton incorrectly assembled and painted by a Jackson Pollock-wanna-be _in blood_.

He helped himself to a top-shelf bottle of scotch, trusting his nose and not bothering to read the label, and proceeded to take an extended swig, foregoing the poncy rocks glass altogether. With the good part of a bottle lubricating his bones, he shook his shoulders loose and cracked his neck, surveying the bar for a worthy opponent or six to pound into the ground. Couldn’t save anybody on a promise, but in maiming and killing, he always hit the mark, even three sheets to the wind. Which, given his vamp constitution, took real commitment.

A trio of Fyarl demon too big for the rear booth they occupied caught his eye. Curiously, the demons were, in turn, swirling, sniffing, and sipping from glasses of red wine, only to spit it back out in a lethal, mucusy projection. Fyarls doing wine tasting? Now he’d seen everything.

“Hey, ugly!” Spike shouted in his best Fyarl, his words just slurred enough to approximate the guttural sounds the language called for. The beasts’ heads swiveled to him in a synchronized fashion, confusion quickly giving way to fury.

“Yeah, you lot! You poncy, nancy wankers and--oh, a _lady_ Fyarl! Well, you miserable troll-smelling tart! You empty-headed animal food trough wipers! Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!”

That achieved the desired effect. A wine glass flew past Spike’s head accompanied by a growl, just before the head honcho Fyarl, flanked by his buddies, ran at him, full speed. In the few seconds before impact, his head cocked back, Spike bounced on the balls of his feet, shouting at the top of his lungs, “Bring it on!”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It was silly, really, sneaking around in her own house. But Dawn was good at it, the sneaking around, like a special agent on a recon mission. Actually, it was more like a scared kid running for her security blanket, but the other thing sounded cooler in her head. Plus she was tired of pretending to be better for Willow and Tara’s sake. Everyone said it was not her fault, that she must not blame herself. But she knew better. _Duh._ Also, not _everyone_ , because _everyone_ hadn’t been by the house since Buffy died; just Willow and Tara. _Did they, like, move in or something? Weird. Weird but good. For the most part._ She definitely did not want to be alone in this big house all by herself right now.

Truth be told, Dawn was slightly apprehensive of the witches. She didn’t trust the knowing looks they shared when they thought she wasn’t looking, the awkward prodding with the twenty questions to make sure she was OK (and she was decidedly NOT OK, and not gonna be, never ever). She didn’t trust the spells that they (Willow more than Tara) secretly muttered under their breaths, and the medicine-y herbal tea they kept making her drink before bed. She also didn’t trust their sunny disposition with the forced cheerfulness, and the sisterly affection so close to her real sister’s passing that it felt as fake as the Bot, a betrayal to Buffy’s memory.

She had hoped to dream of Buffy-- _People do, right, don’t they, after someone’s...gone?_ \--especially since she thought little else during the day. Consumed by guilt and grief and fear in her waking hours, she found it blatantly suspicious that her nights since Glory’s tower had been uniformly calm and dream-free. Not a single nightmare. Not even cryptic, nonsensical, or ordinary dreams. _Shyeah. Had to be magic._

She wished someone else would come by. It was so quiet in the last week. She hadn’t seen Giles or Xander or Anya or even Spike since Glory’s tower. She’d heard phone calls, whispers in the early mornings and late nights, as if she didn’t know they were discussing _her_ \--but still. Were they avoiding her on purpose?

Maybe she shouldn’t have been surprised, because they were ever only Buffy’s Watcher, Buffy’s friends, and Buffy’s not-a-boyfriend. She was just the dumb little sister, the hanger-on that they had to put up with to be near Buffy. Because Buffy was cool, Buffy kicked ass, and Buffy always saved the day. But beyond that, Buffy was her security blanket, her safety net, her family. It was only as her little sister that she had knew any of them. Only because of Buffy had she been made real.

With that thought, she crept into Buffy’s room and silently locked the door behind her.

There had been one tense moment early on, when Dawn had marched into the kitchen one morning with purpose. Catching the witches flirting under the pretense of making pancakes, she threw the announcement in their faces that Buffy’s room was not to be touched under any circumstance. The “or else” part was unsaid but seemed to have knocked Willow back like an elephant that had stormed the room.

Dawn’s one triumphant moment as an authority figure with one defiant command, came as rather a shock to Willow, who had always viewed Dawn as a helpless--therefore easily commandeered--little kid. The youngster had no intention to challenge Willow’s freshly-installed status, in light of her sister’s passing, as the new boss. Neither did she bother, however, to consider just how her one careless teenage act of rebellion might be interpreted by an easily bruised ego unfamiliar with the tactics of a bratty younger sibling; how hostile her territorial claim might seem to the pair of her late sister’s friends who, out of concern for her, borrowed shelter under her roof.

She meant Willow no harm, really really. Okay, she might’ve, just for a teeny tiny bit, relished watching the _Not-a-Sister_ rendered speechless and clearly uncomfortable in the skirmish. But that was only because lately the witch seemed to always have a ton to say to her, and none of which what she wanted to hear.

As if unsure of her own reaction, Willow had kept trying to catch Tara’s eye, much to Dawn’s satisfaction. But the latter readily agreed to Dawn’s request without fuss, and switched without a second thought onto an inquiry regarding how many pancakes Dawn would like for breakfast.

At any rate, everything about the room remained the same: Buffy’s clothes spilt out of her closet. Buffy’s cosmetics littered the top of her dresser. Buffy’s weapons chest (the one with her favorite weapons she didn’t like storing, out of reach, in the living room chest) poked out from under the bed. Buffy’s stuffed animals stood to attention in a row, next to Buffy’s favorite photos, including one featuring the two sisters in identical poses that Dawn had always thought cheesy beyond all get-out.

She grabbed Mr. Gordo and slipped into Buffy’s bed, burrowing deeper under the covers to fend off the shudders. When she closed her eyes, she imagined that her sister was still there. In fact, they had just stayed up too late chatting and hanging out in her room, instant slumber party-style, using pillows to muffle their outbursts of laughter so as not to make Mom any wiser. As Dawn had gotten drowsier and drowsier and still stubbornly rejected going to bed, Buffy gently scooted her down the bed and tucked her in beside herself.

If she kept her eyes very tightly closed and refused to acknowledge the tears that were trickling down her face now to land on Buffy’s pillow below with a barely audible “tap,” “tap,” “tap,” she could imagine her sister falling asleep next to her under the same blanket. They would wake up tomorrow morning to Mom’s yummy breakfast: eggs sunnyside up in a smiley face like Dawn always liked and Buffy always pretended she was too old for, crunchy toast coated in melted butter, and a tall glass of juice--two parts orange, one part grapefruit--for Buffy, milk for Dawn. If she could just hold on to those thoughts as she drifted towards sleep, she thought, then it wouldn’t matter if she had no dreams of Buffy, no dreams at all. She was next to her, where she belonged, safe and soundly asleep, and everything was going to be all right.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“I think Dawn has been sneaking into Buffy’s room to sleep again,” Willow tattled to Giles on speakerphone. Tara frowned at the hint of recrimination in Willow’s voice. They were there as her family, not her prison guards. Why did Willow’s word choice sound so...accusatory?

There was a pause, then came back Giles’s weary reply, “Why do you suppose she feels the need to sneak into Buffy’s room, as opposed to doing so in the open?”

That was clearly not the response Willow had expected. “Well, obviously, she’s grieving in a not-entirely-healthy way, and--”

“Willow, my dear, in all of my years, I have yet to find a way to grieve that is entirely healthy.”

Willow sulked. It almost sounded as if Giles was annoyed with her, and all she’d ever done was care. If she gave off the impression of encroaching upon the teen’s privacy by monitoring her activities in her own house, using a truth or tracking spell here and there, it was done purely out of concern for Dawn. For her own protection. For her own good. She was trying so hard to stand in for the sister Dawn lost, out of love for the grieving teen. It wasn’t anything serious or sinister. Her hard effort wouldn’t have been necessary if Dawn just shared with her willingly.

Getting nothing but silence, Giles continued, “She has suffered unimaginable losses at a difficult age, losing her only family--her mother and her sister--within months of each other. She has the unfortunate fate to have witnessed, in the most traumatic and bizarre way only possible on the Hellmouth, said sister sacrifice herself in order to save her. This, within the same year she discovered that she originated from a mystical energy acting as a dimensional Key, and had been made human only recently, by a secret order of monks. Given the plethora of alarming behaviors you have not mentioned in association with Dawn, which would be easily conceivable under these trying circumstances, I rather think that she is adjusting remarkably well, and is resilient beyond her years. Would you...agree?”

Willow stared at the telephone handset dumbly. How did Giles end up lecturing her about Dawn when she was the one taking care of her, baking fun-time cookies and renting bonding movies and suggesting retail therapy trips to the mall? All while the Slayer-less Watcher watched...what, exactly?

“Y-yes, Mr. Giles. Dawn...is adjusting. I think she just needs more time.” Tara filled the silence, and nudged Willow to say something. Willow’s lips parted, but no sound came out.

“And time she shall have, Tara.” A mirthless chuckle. “Some days I rather think time is all we have.” With that, the conversation came to an end.

Willow whirled on her girlfriend. “ _I_ don’t think Dawn is doing all that well. Otherwise we wouldn’t need to be here, taking care of her. I could’ve used a little backup in front of Giles, Tara.”

“Mr. Giles isn’t wrong, Willow. I think we may have been pushing her too hard,” Tara considered her words carefully, “with the well-meaning distraction strategy.”

“Well-meaning…?” Willow parroted, her mind going a mile a minute. Tara couldn’t be saying what she thought she was saying, right? “Well-meaning” sounded like the kind of thing you said when things weren’t working out, as in, _Oh well, at least she meant well._ But it was working. She was doing a great job being in charge, and of course, taking care of Dawn.

“But it is working! She hardly cries anymore, and she no longer shuts herself in her room all day.”

 _Except,_ Tara thought, _she’s hiding her tears while she’s hiding from us in Buffy’s room._ But Willow didn’t need a direct confrontation; she needed understanding and love. She was mourning her best friend, and had sought to cope by playing the mother hen to Dawn’s reluctant baby chick, hiding her own pain behind an otherwise irrational need to see the teen’s previous liveliness restored lickety-split. Much like snapping your magic fingers together or casting a spell.

Tara smiled kindly, the image of an indulgent mother humoring a kid having a temper tantrum. “We can’t have it both ways, Will. Either she’s not doing well and needs more help than we’re qualified to provide, or this arrangement is working and she just needs us to trust her to be able to deal in her own time.”

“Besides,” she added, seeing that Willow had absentmindedly started to chew on a strand of hair, “she’s only sixteen. They’re unpredictable at that age under the best circumstances. Remember?” She bumped shoulders with her girlfriend with a teasing raise of an eyebrow. “It wasn’t so long ago.”

Wide-eyed and slack-jawed, Willow reached for her girlfriend’s hand, so warm in her lap. “How come you are so wise, with the unflustered eloquence?”

 _That_ made Tara blush and her heart fluster. She bought herself a few seconds by covering their joined hands with her free hand. “Oh, Willow. If I’m wise, it’s because you lend weight to my opinions. If I’m eloquent, it’s because you gave me a voice.”

At that, all the morning’s unpleasantness with Giles melted away from Willow’s mind.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

No eyes but clarity of vision, casting the now backward and onward--  
No sound but lifted the belljar of silence, of words held back, of thoughts unframed--  
No form but cradled in warmth, wrapped in love, and immersed in peace--  
  
If there is a body, there’s no more vigor to sustain, no more injuries to bear, no more time-laden doom of wear-and-tear to defend, no more frailties that shackle and bind--  
  
If there is reason, there’s no reason to be, no rousing bugle or cries of battle, no instruments of destruction to wield and inflict, no nectar of victory to soothe the sorest defeat--  
  
No more power, no more strength, no more Calling, no more, no more--  
There is much to gain in the loss, no loss at all; its burden a relief, a Gift now for another, any other--  
  
Is there...an I? A _Buffy_?  
My senses stretch to fill all time and space, looking for an edge to caress--  
Yet infinite is my release--  
  
Infinite is my release.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Anya tossed the calculator carelessly back into the drawer and bumped it shut with an economic swing of her hips. She had sought to cheer herself up from the lull in the Magic Box by going over last month’s accounting and by losing herself in the eternal elegance of arithmetics. The tradition of bookkeeping was just gaining popularity among merchants when she was a child, so long ago, using Greek numerals that took up a lot of parchment and ink that blackened the fleshy part of her hand when she brushed against it too soon. The simple, dependable rules of addition and subtraction had fascinated her then, in a harsh life where survival was, at best, uncertain; they always infused her with nostalgia now, in a world so different yet no less belligerent.

Presently they failed her, though through no fault of their own. Last month was a wash at best, what with all the store closures she’d had to endure while they alternatively fled from then pursued Glory. The sum from the receipts were so meager, she hadn’t needed the calculator, and that was before carrying forward the amortized charges from the last round of repairs. Why the battleground had had to be _her_ store she could not understand. Well, it wasn’t her store yet, but it was only a matter of time, right? Giles would be summoned by the Watchers Council and reassigned any day now.

Her forehead creased with thoughts of the future. Everyone around her avoided discussions of the days ahead like the plague, as if wallowing in the past would stop the eternal march of time, as if living in denial would bring Buffy back. Her death was sad, no doubt about it, but it was a good death, a warrior’s death.

The vengeance demon in her understood this. What hadn’t she seen in her thousand-plus-year tenure? Kingdoms crumbled. Dynasties fell away. People died all the time, some for noble causes, some for no good reason at all. Some, quite a few, died at her hands, but only because they deserved it--she had a code, after all. She might’ve started a war or two, inadvertently, of course. She had survived the actual plague, twice. She had borne witness to plenty of death and destruction of human origin. It was the circle of life. Buffy had been called for the protection of this world, her Slayer’s power but a loan and a mark of her sacred duty, until death. She fulfilled it with valor and determination. It had been a worthy, well-lived life.

So all this weeping and moping irked her. It was no way to honor a Slayer. They should be living their lives, not mourning her passing. Buffy understood that the sum of the collective values of ordinary lives exceeded that of an extraordinary hero. Like the penny drive Anya had done for the Sunnydale Humane Society, each penny so insignificant that sometimes even those not making a purchase would dig through their pockets and purses to donate one or five. Yet together, they added up to something meaningful. Such as warm and well-fed puppies.

There was no point in ruminating, brooding over could-haves and should-haves. That way lay vengeance, and now that she’d washed her hands clean of the whole business, she didn’t want to end up on the wrong side of that exchange. Or see her friends end up there.

 _Friends._ Were they her friends now? She thought of Willow and Tara and Giles and Dawn. Of Willow’s open hostility and Tara’s shyness and Giles’s reserved judgement and Dawn’s self-absorbed teenage rebellion. They were Xander’s friends, and since she and Xander were engaged to be married, by California law she’d own half of their allegiance, right? Turning human had meant losing her demon friends, with the exception of a few close to her heart, whom she’d known for centuries. Throwing her lot in with the Slayer had been an act of love and loyalty, more for Xander than anything or anyone else. But now, even those few gave her a wide berth, preferring to steer clear of her path. What did that leave her, exactly? And who was she these days?

Anya found being human much harder than extracting vengeance from humans. The rules of communication and social interactions Xander kept throwing at her, with abstract and slippery words like _tact_ and _finesse_ and _appropriateness_ , were more like rules of un-communication and un-interaction, because they invariably translated to not saying things on her mind (such as praising Xander’s sexual prowess to his friends) and not doing things she thought were helpful (such as asking to assist shoppers to spend their money in the Magic Box). She was only making sure that her boyfriend felt appreciated and that her customers left happy. She couldn’t see what was so wrong about either.

She swept aside thoughts of a confusing sort, and focused on planning ahead. That was something practical and tangible she could tackle. She was getting married! She couldn’t help squealing with delight. There was so much to do, so much to decide, that it was absolutely exhilarating! Wedding planning is going to be one of the best things about being human; she just knew it.

And Giles leaving...would make her a sole proprietor, at least in practice. Giles might prefer to hold on to the partnership on paper--old Watcher-types always dragged their feet when it came to change--but she was okay with that. _Sole proprietor!_ She threw her head back in pride as she rolled the words off her tongue, savoring them. That was what she was, a businesswoman in charge. She liked the sound of that.

The bell rang and Anya looked up to see Giles shuffle through the front door, his face unreadable. Well, even more so than usual. Did he use a mirror to practice this look of vague disapproval mixed with mild concern? It seemed like it’d be a hard look to master.

“Look who decided to show up to work today!” Anya said, by way of greeting. Not that she couldn’t handle the store on her own, but she had work ethics. She’d worked for over a thousand years, and expected partners to pull their weight.

Giles didn’t react, taking away Anya’s ammunition. “Yes…” slowly, as if the thoughts were still forming, he said, “I wonder if I may--” he gestured for the backroom.

Anya snapped to attention and followed Giles to the backroom, trying hard to suppress a smile. _Sole proprietor! Sole proprietor!_ A chorus was going off in her head, which made the smile-suppressing difficult.

Giles waited until they were both seated, with the desk between them, before he offered, “Surely you will have guessed that I won’t be remaining in Sunnydale long.”

 _Bingo!_ Anya’s eyes lit up. She had been waiting for this conversation. She was ready for this. She was going to nail it like the promotion it was, nail it with a decisive stab of a pin at just that vulnerable place, and watch it wriggle and writhe helplessly until it ceased struggling. She was born ready.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Xander nervously plucked a yellowing leaf off of the bouquet of red roses in his hands as he rounded a corner, the Magic Box’s lit sign beckoning from a mere block away. The bouquet had looked beautiful, effortlessly arranged in the florist’s vase, but now, cellophaned against his callused hands, it looked fragile and awkward. He didn’t much like the thought of giving something that would die in just a few short days as a symbol of his love, but he knew Anya would perk up at freshly cut flowers.

Personally, he preferred potted plants, something sturdy and self-sustaining and whole, with roots and everything. He liked the idea of taking care of something that would thrive in return, especially on the Hellmouth. Sadly, he’d never been much of a gardener beyond supplying the hardware. A wooden planter or raised garden bed, now that was something he could sink his tools into. See, most people didn’t realize, but the secret of a well-constructed multi-level raised garden bed was--

He cut that thought short and forced himself to rehearse, once more, the sort-of-a-speech he had prepared and practiced. Anya looked so hurt during dinner last night, when he had zoned out for just a second to fret about Buffy’s funeral. Her accusation had not been groundless; Xander realized, holding the shaking form of his tearful fiancee in his arms, that he had been neglecting her, at least emotionally. Hence the flowers, bought and to be delivered in person with a heart-felt apology on his morning break. And that wasn’t even his trump card: dinner reservation for two in a booth, at Ristorante Venezia at seven o’clock tonight. The town had been all abuzz with news of its hot grand opening, and to recommend it further, the _Sunnydale Herald_ had just reviewed it as the best Italian restaurant in town. Anya was going to be thrilled.

Although it had never occurred to Xander to walk away, he had to admit that being the Slayer’s friend had been a full-time job. Whittling stakes, repairing furniture, planning strategies, diving into demon research, even jumping into the fights. During what he’d come to think of as apocalypse season on the Hellmouth--late spring to early summer, every year--it’d turn into a 24/7 gig. He had no time for outside friends or other hobbies. Consequently, he had no outside friends or other hobbies. He wouldn’t even have time to date, if he hadn’t brought Anya into the Scooby gang.

That was the good and the bad. Outside work, he and Anya were always together, sure, but it was never about them. Buffy, whenever she was around, was always the center of gravity, pulling everyone else off orbit to rotate around her instead. As for the emotional side…cowabunga! Always heavy, full-forced and head-on, draining him like a--a 12-volt dual-speed cordless drill drains rechargeable batteries. He cursed under his breath at the thought of dying batteries while under a deadline. The day, the very day lithium-ion batteries made it to drills, he was going to--

All right, all right. Enough tool talk. There were more pressing issues at hand. Pausing outside the Magic Box to collect himself, he thought, _here goes nothing_. Just as he was about to push the door open, he heard Giles’s voice, sounding weary and defeated, “...I won’t be remaining in Sunnydale long.”

Xander withdrew his hand. Giles was leaving? With everything unsettled and messed up and crazy and the Hellmouth unguarded-- _and holy moly that’s a scary thought_ , right when they needed adult supervision from a real adult--the kind that understood responsibility and exhibited emotional maturity, not just the kind barely of legal drinking age--he was going to pull a John Lennon and break up the Scoobies?

 

~ ~ To be Continued ~ ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of Spike's insult to the Fyarl is from the movie "Monty Python and the Holy Grail". Spike references Monty Python several times on BtVS. Clearly, he’s a fan.


	3. On the Shore of the Wide World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Giles first starts a couple's fight (unwittingly, of course), then becomes the hero of the day (unplanned), and Spike has a nice dream (that's not really uplifting), and a rude awakening (that's helpful in the long run).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is taken from the poem “When I Have Fears” by John Keats, quoted at the beginning of the chapter. Rated R for strong language and violence.
> 
> I tip my hat and bow to my wonderful beta readers, DaniWhoSlayer and All4Spike: I could not have done this without you. Thank you!

**Chapter 3. On the Shore of the Wide World**

_When I have fears that I may cease to be_  
_Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,_  
_Before high-piled books, in charactery,_  
_Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain;_  
_When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,_  
_Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,_  
_And think that I may never live to trace_  
_Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;_  
_And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,_  
_That I shall never look upon thee more,_  
_Never have relish in the faery power_  
_Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore_  
_Of the wide world I stand alone, and think_  
_Till love and fame to nothingness do sink._  
  
_\-- “When I Have Fears”, by John Keats_  
  


_“Surely you will have guessed that I won’t be remaining in Sunnydale long.”_  
  
Anya could hardly contain her excitement. She knew how to interview for a position she was more than qualified to handle: deliver short, action-filled sentences with plenty of confidence and enthusiasm. “I can handle the store on my own, Giles. My skills are more than a match for the task. You’ve witnessed how I’ve been able to turn this store around and make it profitable. Now I may have to hire someone to help me move heavy inventory and mind the store while I take care of the accounting,” Anya thought out loud. “But don’t worry. Without having to pay you, which requires a co-owner’s salary, the cash flow will actually improve.” Having given Giles that piece of good news, Anya beamed at Giles and waited for him to cheer up.  
  
Instead, he let out a mirthless chuckle. Softly, almost too softly for Anya to hear, he said, “Apparently, I’m even less needed than I thought.” Then louder and more determined, “Very well. To help smooth the transition, I will notify the suppliers I’ve been handling and give you an introduction. You’re more than welcome to contact me, of course, should the occasion arise that I may be of assistance.”  
  
Anya waved away that thought like an annoying gnat. “Oh, I’ll be fine, Giles. Quit dithering.” She thought she should nail down the exact terms of their partnership before Giles left, since it would directly affect budgets and profits--but later. Right now, she wanted to appear confident and authoritative, as if she had all the answers in the world and nothing could ever faze her.  
  
Giles looked rather hurt, which confused Anya, who was doing everything to put Giles’ mind at ease. Then she remembered reading an article on _small talk_ , which someone with a lot of titles behind his name had called “the thread of social fabric.” It had sounded like the kind of thing Xander would want her to learn. Anya resolved to tame the thread with a firm but surprisingly enlightened system of reward and punishment and become the best weaver she could be. She would master it until it rolled over obediently, exposed its soft belly, and called her _Boss_. She dutifully prompted Giles with the _small talk_ , “When’s your departing flight?”  
  
“Eh…” Giles sputtered, “I uhm--that is to say, I haven’t exactly settled on a date yet. You see, Buffy’s funeral--”  
  
“Oh, right! Tomorrow at sundown,” Anya supplied helpfully. “Of course you wouldn’t leave until after Buffy’s funeral.”  
  
“Quite right.” Giles looked as if he was struggling to come up with something else to say, which pleased Anya. She had seen another conversation come to a successful conclusion, like closing a sale. _Well done!_ She mentally patted herself on the back.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
A sudden crash from the front of the store cut short Giles’ effort to inject a new topic into their dying conversation and instead, brought it to a premature end. Anya darted out in an instant, and Giles, thinking fast, picked up the crossbow leaning against the wall, and followed in haste.  
  
Xander, one arm gingerly cradling a bouquet of roses, was righting a stand of walking sticks. His legs kept getting tangled in the process. Giles lowered his crossbow and watched the boy’s clumsy efforts at reparation, which only unwittingly sprinkled blood-red petals over the whole display.  
  
“Oh, honey!” Anya squealed with delight, “You bought me roses!”  
  
Briefly, Xander froze like a deer caught in the headlights, then redoubled his effort only to fail twice as fast. With a sheepish grin, he shouted back over the clattering, “Anya, Giles, yeah, little help here…”  
  
Anya dashed to his rescue and lifted the roses out of his arms, gently as if it were a puppy. “Awww, poor flowers,” she cooed at them. “Let me find you a vase and some water, and you’ll perk up in no time!”  
  
Both stunned, Giles and Xander watched her leave for the backroom, a spring in her step.  
  
Xander resumed shoving the walking sticks back onto the hooks, only to have them crash down to the floor again. Heaven only knows how the boy had managed to keep his job in construction. No longer able to watch from the sidelines, Giles stepped up.  
  
“Would you please--,” said Giles with forced calmness, “stop moving!” Xander froze. Giving him a stern look, Giles reached out and restored the chaos back to order.  
  
“Sorry about that, Giles,” he mumbled. As if determined to prevent his hands from getting in trouble again, he shoved them deep into his pockets. With a hangdog expression on his face, he grumbled, “Why would a magic store carry canes? Do you get a lot of senior customers?”  
  
“They’re walking sticks, not canes.” Anya reappeared and placed the roses, now in a tall crystal vase, on the counter. “They appeal to customers with an interest in Victorian fashion, and people who cosplay as mages. I’ve analyzed our customer demographics and diversified our inventory portfolio to increase product offering for our top market segments. You wouldn’t understand.”  
  
The boy nodded numbly, clearly eager to concur. Giles doubted Xander even knew all of the words in Anya’s over-enthusiastic explanation. In fact, Xander looked downright lost as he appeared to survey the inventory meaningfully, taking in the shelves of herbs and crystals, eyes lingering over spell books and the occasional fertility god. In the two years that the Magic Box had served as a sort of command central for slaying, he’d never shown any interest in the world of magic. Now he looked disoriented, as if he hadn’t been frequenting it like a second home, but had only stumbled upon it for the first time quite accidentally.  
  
Anya didn’t seem to notice Xander’s discomfort. Throwing her arms around him and standing on tiptoes to give him a passionate kiss, she added sweetly, “Thanks for the flowers, hon.”  
  
Afraid he might inadvertently witness something not fit for public consumption, Giles cleared his throat behind them. “Time for my exit. Anya has proven quite capable of running the Magic Box on her own. I will see you and the rest of the gang tomorrow at Buffy’s funeral.”  
  
He turned to leave, but Xander blocked his path. “And then what? You’ll leave Sunnydale?”  
  
“Seeing that my Council obligation has concluded here, yes.”  
  
“This all just obligation to you? I thought you’d built a life here, Giles, with us.” His tone was surprisingly vehement. Giles was taken aback. Among the group, Xander had always exhibited the most respect for seniority and hierarchy. Whereas Buffy had been challenging, Willow inquisitive, Anya dismissive, Spike confrontational, and Dawn apprehensive, Xander had always upheld Giles’ Council-backed official title as basis for his authority. Perhaps the boy considered Giles’ decision to leave to be a willing abdication of his leadership status, and with it, all accorded deference.  
  
Giles sighed in resignation. This was precisely what he had hoped to avoid. Setting business to order with Anya had been necessary. He hadn’t anticipated seeing any of the Scoobies here, not this early in the day, when Xander would be at work and the rest of them at school. His plan had been to delay the announcement and slip it to the gang after the funeral, then answer any questions once and for all. The prospect of repeat reveals and appeals, on a matter he considered personal and suspected to be untenable, seemed more exhausting than he could withstand at the moment.  
  
Neither did he wish to dwell on the fact that the decision had been extremely difficult, and his resolve shaky to begin with. He had to get out of there, before the grief consumed him, devoured him, settled in the large hole in his heart like the Southern California smog that never budged on windless summer days like this, and permeated to stifle every aspect of his remaining, tattered life.  
  
“Xander…it’s time that...” he started patiently, sensing the need to placate, only to break off when he realized he had no idea what to say, how much to disclose. Years of secrecy by necessity due to the nature of his work combined with casual passivity on his part had reduced his social circle to essentially his Slayer’s social circle, which consisted mainly of members of the MTV generation brought up on _Jerry Springer_. They valued habitual oversharing and emotional confessions above their respect for personal boundaries, prized melodrama followed by a quick resolution over nuanced development of genuine progress.  
  
Giles wasn’t one of them: His thought process could not be distilled into a single bullet point to suit their short attention span. His need for healing could not be satisfied by the Californian belief in the therapeutic powers of a group hug, or by anything external at all. In the end, his English upbringing won out. “It’s time,” he finished simply.  
  
Xander bristled. “That’s it? ‘It’s time’? What, now that the one-week Council-imposed mourning period is over, you’re just going to abandon ship and leave us? Desert us?” Chest puffing, Xander seemed poised for a fight.  
  
Giles cringed and retreated further into stoicism. He heard the hurt behind Xander’s accusation, and he had no wish to hurt anyone. How many apocalypses had they prevented as a group, standing side-by-side, fighting shoulder-to-shoulder? Was it too much to wish for an amicable farewell, a dignified departure, a gentle slip into that good night?  
  
“Xander,” Anya looked like she could no longer hold herself back. “Do you really think the Watchers’ Council won’t recall Giles and give him a new assignment? They’re probably waiting for him to report back right now.”  
  
Anya jumping to his rescue was unexpected, but Giles was not going to look a gift ex-demon in the mouth. He had always fought his own battles, and now he desired nothing more than a rest. He’d earned it with his losses, hadn’t he?  
  
Suddenly it occurred to Giles that a capable, ambitious business partner like Anya would naturally crave the opportunity to stretch her wings and fly solo, taking the Magic Box to new heights. Losing him would be akin to shedding dead weight. The thought that his departure might at least make someone’s dream come true proved to be bittersweet.  
  
Meanwhile, Xander whirled on Anya, and before Xander even opened his mouth, Giles felt sorry for him. He had a feeling Anya won every lovers’ spat she’d ever had, and poor Xander would only be redirecting his anger, anger Giles had caused.  
  
He had purposely neglected to mention that he was, in fact, going on holiday. He had requested a month of leave from the Council which, given the circumstances, had acquiesced. He glanced at the couple. Xander and Anya were now locked in a heated argument, which was probably not even about him anymore. Before either of them could notice, he seized his opportunity and slipped out of the Magic Box.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
_“Spike!”_  
  
_He could hear the tears in her voice and scent her desperation. He leapt up the last three steps to land on the platform and took in the scene. Dawn, tear-stained but unhurt, was bound at the end of the platform. A few steps away, Doc, curiously dressed in a tuxedo, tried to conceal an ornate knife. The air felt charged with destiny, humming with magic. It was almost time._  
  
_“‘S alright, Nibblet. Spike’s here.”_  
  
_From his vantage point atop Glory’s tower, Spike could barely make out the Scoobies below, pressed into a gradual retreat by the line of minions and crazies. Even this far away, the scent of human blood mingled with demon blood stung his nose. By the sound of Glory’s wailing pleas, Buffy was winning. A good sign. This, here, was to be his fight._  
  
_He deliberately evened out his breathing. He needed to be calm and steady, focused and decisive. There was no margin for error here; he had too sodding much riding on it. Various strategies and fighting sequences flashed through his mind. An escape involving getting Dawn out of her restraint was unlikely. He could play out the delay tactic, as Doc was the only one on a deadline, but… Nah, that was never gonna fly. And not his style, truth be told. He was going to have to take out Doc, without spilling a drop of Dawn’s blood. With hand-to-hand combat, his favorite dance._  
  
_Doc’s head swiveled like an insect’s, but it was Spike who felt pinned. “I was just keeping this lovely Key here company. And you’ve made it a crowd.”_  
  
_Spike growled, shifting to game face to call forth all of his powers. “You don't come near the girl, Doc.”_  
  
_“We’ll see about that.”_  
  
_The demon charged, surprisingly spry, knife hand stealing forward to aim at Spike’s abdomen. With vampire speed, Spike dodged the attack, taking advantage of the opening to wedge himself between Doc and Dawn, and pressed forward. A little more room for maneuvering._  
  
_Normally he wouldn’t have bothered to watch such an insignificant weapon so intently, considering battle wounds more than a point of pride for a warrior, like badges of honor. Not tonight. He couldn’t afford to be distracted or slowed down by a flesh wound. Not to mention, ritualistically, even a single drop of Dawn’s blood could do the trick. He would’ve paid equal attention to a nail clipper._  
  
_Doc flexed his fighting hand, a sinister smile spreading to his bug-like eyes. “I don't smell a soul anywhere on you... Why do you even care?”_  
  
_Spike’s eyes flicked briefly to Dawn’s. “I made a promise to a lady.”_  
  
_They rushed each other then, Spike landing a high kick on Doc’s wrist that sent the knife flying in a wide arc. Recovering quickly, Doc swept out Spike’s standing leg, and the vampire landed sprawling on the platform._  
  
_“Well, I’ll send the lady your regrets,” he taunted._  
  
_As Doc bent down and pulled back his arm to strike, Spike sat up and headbutted him, hard. Doc let out an involuntary cry, face contorted with pain. Springing up, Spike slammed his fist repeatedly into Doc’s face and torso, earning groans and with the last blow, a sickening crunch._  
  
_“Oh, yeah?” Spike roared. He flexed his fingers, then redoubled his effort. “But you’re already dressed for your own funeral!”_  
  
_He was going for the winning strike when Doc opened his mouth wide and his purple tongue shot out, fierce like a viper and agile like a frog’s, to twine tightly around Spike’s neck. He found himself spun around, raised in the air with his feet kicking uselessly, finding no purchase. Doc was chuckling behind him with a sickening gurgle, fighting to dust him now, not just to wound, and his heart sank when the punches he threw proved futile against the appendage cutting into his neck. High above the whistle of wind whipping past his ears was a scream, a girl’s scream, his name. For one moment frozen in time, his eyes found Dawn’s, fear met with fear, and wordlessly he beseeched her forgiveness, undeserving though he was._  
  
_In his despair Spike suddenly remembered the extra axe--Buffy’s axe--stashed in his coat pocket--a nimble little number he had intended for one of the Scoobies, not a poleaxe, which he preferred. He swung it backward, edge first, with all his might, until it met with a satisfying resistance. The slick snake-like muscle wound around his neck loosened instantly, then went lax. He turned around just in time to watch Doc’s axe-embedded body lose its balance over the edge of the platform._  
  
_Savoring the view one last moment before rushing to free Dawn, Spike said to nobody in particular, “Not this time, you bloody reptile! I keep my word.”_  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Giles felt a headache taking shape after leaving the Magic Box. He could use a drink. Sadly it was too early in the morning for propriety, and then there were those last minute details of the funeral to take care of. Hiding the death of the Slayer, which they had all deemed prudent, meant foregoing official channels for her burial. Giles had to do everything piecemeal, leaving no paper trail behind. It was a tiresome process, even armed with Council training on such matters and Council referrals to relevant merchants practiced in discretion.  
  
Oh, such were the extent of his knowledge. Giles permitted a moment of self-pity to take hold. Demon physiology, magical spells and properties, and funeral arrangements on the down-low. He would be burying a hero, yet had to resort to tactics of the criminal. It left a very bad taste in his mouth. Bugger, he needed a drink. To hasten his journey, he considered cutting through the demon part of town, which was usually safe to do during the day, after all.  
  
“Ptsss--”  
  
It was remarkable to him that the human citizens of Sunnydale never questioned the supernatural elements and events in their town, never paid them any attention. _Sunnydale-itis_ , Willow had called it, this wilful ignorance that had most definitely contributed to the population of the dead outnumbering the population of the living in Sunnydale. That a demon could operate a florist business in broad daylight without so much as a double-take from her customers was evidence enough.  
  
“Ptsss--”  
  
Giles paused a moment to determine the best route. Right. Straight ahead then turn at the light and--  
  
“Hey, Watcher!”  
  
He spun on his feet, fist automatically raised high to strike. Willy cowered, palms up, “Don’t-kill-me-I-come-in-peace!” he rushed out, hands shaking, eyes shut.  
  
Giles allowed himself to relax at the recognition. “Willy. What possible business could you and I have in common?”  
  
“Zero, none, absolutely nothing! I’m sorry! Don’t kill me, please!”  
  
“I’m not going to hurt you, you berk! Speak!”  
  
Willy tentatively opened one eye, noted the lack of fists or weapons aimed for his head, and straightened himself. “I would never bother you, never think of it. Slayer would have my life! Just at my wit’s end, that’s all. What’s a guy to do… But you passing by my humble door is surely a sign, and--”  
  
“Willy--” Giles pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration.  
  
Willy looked left and right, eyes darting from shadow to shadow as if to make out imaginary spies concealed within--signs of paranoia. The streets were as empty as ever in the bright sun. Giles dug deep down into his reserves of patience and with effort, evened out his voice. “I’m going to ask you again: what do you want?”  
  
Willy shook his head rapidly, like a scared child. “Wouldn’t dream of asking you favors. Don’t want trouble. Please don’t kill me! A simple lost-and-found, that’s all,” he inclined his head toward his bar, then gestured for Giles to follow.  
  
Giles hesitated. Given a large enough reward as motivation, the scoundrel would sell his own mother.  
  
Willy huffed, “Oh, come on, man! Who you take me for? What kind of putz would dare go up against a Watcher, in broad daylight no less! I’m insulted that you’d even suggest-- As God is my witness, no harm would come to you in my bar. Just-just spare my life, all right? It’s not my fault is all I’m saying. I see trouble and I fold. And what does trouble do? Doubles down on me...”  
  
He continued to prattle as he retreated into the bar, mouth going a mile a minute, spewing streams of mumble jumble which, as much as Giles could decipher, alternated between denials of wrongdoing and pleas for his life. Giles followed cautiously.  
  
In the musty darkness of Willy’s bar, Giles blinked and waited for his eyes and nose to adjust, his trusty dagger held fast and steady in his hand. He heard a groan from the very back, where Willy was currently shifting uncertainly from one foot to another.  
  
He crossed the bar in a few confident strides to see a mess of a dark form curled in on itself on the filthy floor. A pair of bloodied hands, ivory bones poking out of the knuckles, clutched a tattered blanket to its head. A drunk demon, asleep. No, passed out. He looked up at Willy. “What’s the meaning of--”  
  
Willy lifted the blanket in a swift reveal, and Giles took an indrawn breath. “What happened?”  
  
Willy swallowed nervously. “It wasn’t me! I swear it wasn’t me! Ducked out for an hour. Came back to find the bar about destroyed! Liquor ransacked, cash register raided, furniture nothing but broken heaps of wood--” he gestured at a three-legged table nearby for corroboration, and Giles noted, for the first time, that the bar was completely wrecked and in utter disarray.  
  
“Ain’t nobody left to pick up the tab. I started cleaning, and was about to close shop near sunrise when I found this loser in the alley out back, snoozing the snooze next to the dumpster and cradling a bottle of my _Macallan Fine Oak 25_.” Willy looked as if he was about to weep at the thought of his good whisky wasted on the unworthy. “Dragged him in before his sorry ass could dust in the sun. I’m a businessman. I ain’t taking sides. Know he runs with your crowd these days, and I’m not about to invite the Slayer and her many pointy weapons upon my neck!”  
  
It was difficult to follow Willy’s stream-of-consciousness rambling, but Giles thought he caught the gist of it.  
  
He shook the form covered by remnants of a t-shirt and jeans. “Wake up! Come on, wake up!” It felt wet. Giles rubbed his fingers and held them up for a better look; they were coated in blood.  
  
The vampire stirred, wiped his eyes, and looked straight at Giles. “I saved her, Watcher, you hear me? Saved her good…” His voice was thick and nasal, but there was no mistaking what he said. Letting out a dejected laugh, he closed his eyes again.  
  
Willy nudged Giles and said in a conspiratorial tone, “Who’d he save? That’s all I could get outta him. He’s all choked up about it.”  
  
Lips pressed into a thin line, Giles pulled a couple of twenties out of his wallet and held them out to Willy. “For your discretion,” he said, holding onto the bills for just a second longer so that Willy understood the unspoken consequences of retelling this particular story.  
  
“Discretion, yeah yeah, sure. Slayer business, I get it...” Willy seemed emboldened by the money in his hands, as if it were a protection charm. His voice no longer trembled. “He’s all yours,” he indicated the unmoving form on the floor with his chin, before snickering, “William the Bloody...well, he’s real bloody now.”  
  
Giles took a long look at Spike and thought, regrettably and just this once, that he would have to agree with Willy the Snitch.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Having deposited Spike back in his crypt for the second time in as many weeks, Giles was furious. He had planned on asking Spike to stay in Sunnydale to lend a hand in his absence, but that notion seemed absurd now. Spike, broken, drunk, and muttering under his breath like a bloody madman, was in no shape to be of use to anyone, not even to himself. And this time, Giles couldn’t even ring Xander to help shoulder the vampire’s weight, quite literally, after the way he’d left things in the Magic Box.  
  
“I saved her, Watcher...Don’t tell me I din’t… Ev’ry night I...save her...” From the armchair, the barely conscious vampire waved his hand in an exaggerated flourish, and upon completing his Victorian bow, crashed to the floor. That sent him into a fit of giggles.  
  
It had twisted Giles’ inside to make sense of the vampire’s ramblings the first time around, at Willy’s. _Buffy._ Of course, Spike would be mourning Buffy. This time, however, with his head pounding and his back throbbing with pain from having to carry Spike’s dead weight in a mad dash from Willy’s car to the safety of his crypt, Giles found his sympathy waning. In fact, it seemed downright self-indulgent. Desperate times called for desperate measures. He pulled Spike up by what could pass for his collar, and slapped him hard.  
  
Spike’s head whipped as far back as it could go from the impact. “Oi! Whazzat for?” He opened one eye and growled at Giles. It might’ve been menacing if he weren’t drooling on himself.  
  
“Take a hard look at yourself, you candy-assed sissy! Buffy died so that this world wouldn’t end, and you will not tarnish her memory by behaving as if it did!”  
  
Giles chose his uncharacteristic diction for the sole purpose of getting a rise out of Spike, but the latter was apparently too busy wallowing in misery to notice. Giving no indication that he’d registered a single word, Spike pushed off the ground just high enough to flop back into his chair, then threw an arm across his eyes to return to chanting his mantra undisturbed. “Save her...every night I save her...every night--”  
  
“You’re not saving anyone in this wretched condition! For Heaven’s sake, Spike! Have you forgotten your promise to Buffy already? _Dawn lives!_ ”  
  
There was a terrible sound, more animal than human, of a choked-back sob. As Giles watched for further reaction, the limp hand draped over Spike’s face twitched, tightened into a fist, then slowly, as if with effort, trembled open. Dawn’s name was apparently the magic word. “Nibblet…” Spike’s voice wavered, then burst into open weeping. ”Oh God, I’ve been a right wanker!”  
  
Giles resisted the urge to comfort the heart-broken vampire. Spike needed to snap out of it. Quietly but with unmistakable heat, he pressed on, “Not long ago, you were ready to lay down your unlife for her. Buffy claimed that you swore to protect her. Was that all just a ploy to get Buffy into bed with you?”  
  
Spike’s whole body jolted, as if Giles’ words delivered a shot of torment that pierced to the bone. Giles had a flashback of witnessing writhing demon bodies held in unforgiving currents from the Initiative’s tasers. In a blink, Spike lurched up and got in Giles’ face, almost managing to cover up his stagger, “’M a vamp of my word. Lost my head for a while there, but far as Nibblet’s concerned, you can count on me.” He held his head high, uncaring that his face was grief-stricken and tear-stained.  
  
Having achieved the desired result, Giles hid a smile. “Very well. Here’s something for which I’m counting on you: Funeral’s tomorrow at sundown. You know where. I trust you’ll be presentable, if only for Dawn’s sake.”  
  
With that he departed the crypt, leaving an anguished but reawakening vampire to nurse his injuries in private. Recalling Willow’s heart-breaking report on Dawn, Giles sincerely hoped he had knocked enough senses into Spike. God willing, Spike and Dawn might just save each other. And about bloody time, too.  
  


~ To be Continued ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) The Glory’s tower dream scene adapts bits of dialogue from S5 “The Gift” by Joss Whedon, for continuity and context.
> 
> 2) Let me know if you have any comments or questions. Doesn't matter if you're reading this the minute after I post, or five years later. It'd make my day to hear back from you! Really really! :)


	4. I Am Not Resigned

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The funeral. This is the first time in the story we see all the Scoobies together. Will they manage an emotional break-through or insist on being alone even while together?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've always felt cheated that at the end of Season 5 of BtVS, we didn't get a funeral for Buffy, a venue to channel all of our grief for her, an at-the-time-final chance to say goodbye. As a fan I needed the closure...however temporary. The show didn't give us a funeral, so I wrote one. :)
> 
> Chapter title is taken from the poem “Dirge Without Music”, by Edna St. Vincent Millay, quoted at the beginning of the chapter. Canon-compliant. Rated PG-13.

**Chapter 4. I Am Not Resigned**

_I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground._  
_So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:_  
_Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned_  
_With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned._  
  
_Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you._  
_Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust._  
_A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,_  
_A formula, a phrase remains,—but the best is lost._  
  
_The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love,—_  
_They are gone. They are gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled_  
_Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve._  
_More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world._  
  
_Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave_  
_Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;_  
_Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave._  
_I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned._

_\-- “Dirge Without Music”, by Edna St. Vincent Millay_

  
  
In the delicate, golden light of dusk, in a tranquil grove on the outskirts of Sunnydale, a group was assembling. Meticulously attired, with men in crisp suits and women in soft flowing dresses, they came together, in singles and pairs, bearing flowers. A truck was parked nearby, sheltered by foliage that prevented it from being visible from the road. Laden with precious cargo, it had been maneuvered into position with care; but due to sheer weight, had proven powerless to prevent the parallel gouges its tires had carved deep into the soft dirt in its wake. Like tear tracks. Like wounds.  
  
Shielded from the last ray of the sun by the surrounding trees, a dark figure, clad in a leather duster, slipped in and merged with the group. Greetings and hugs were exchanged in whispers and stifled tears.  
  
They had come to bid a final goodbye to Buffy Summers, the Slayer.  
  
The group shifted to gather in front of a fresh grave, and the men marched to the truck. With Giles and Xander in front and Spike in the back, they slowly shouldered the casket to the grave, their footfalls muffled by the soft, lush grass grown unbridled. The women hummed, low and soothing, and Giles listened for the tune. No, not _Amazing Grace_. It was not grace that brought them here, no matter how they’d grown to accept this death. Ah, _Somewhere Over the Rainbow_ , and Giles smiled despite himself. It felt right.  
  
As the men lowered the casket into the grave, Dawn began to weep. Willow slid an arm around her waist as Tara rubbed her back and whispered in her ear. She nodded, then took the proffered tissue out of Anya’s hand and dabbed her eyes.  
  
The heavy lifting done, the men fell away, and rejoined the group.  
  
The sun dipped below the horizon; the air stilled. Giles prefaced his goodbye with the Slayer prophecy, the one that had been branded upon all of their hearts:  
  
_“Into every generation, there is a chosen one. One girl in all the world. She alone will wield the strength and skill to stand against the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness; To stop the spread of their evil and the swell of their numbers. She is the Slayer._  
  
“One girl in all the world,” he repeated, looking away, waiting for his eyes to clear. After a moment, he continued, “This is the life we’re celebrating today.”  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Spike stared at the coffin, mass-produced and store-purchased and unremarkable, and thought it unbefitting of the victorious Slayer, Heaven’s Chosen One, so often relegated to anonymity among the humans she gave her life to protect, yet universally respected and feared by demonkind. She alone was the bogeyman to reign over the misdeeds of those who dwell in Darkness, her name mentioned but in whispers of awe and trepidation.  
  
Equally inadequate was it for Buffy, the woman he had loved and loved still, ordinary where she was phenomenal, a harsh shell for such a delicate form, the shelter it bestowed a poor substitute for her own power and resilience.  
  
He would have preferred the ritual of the olden days, to see a warrior’s remains go up in flames atop a raging pyre, to see fire purified in fire. To watch the corpse that betrayed the bearer’s lively spirit reduced to the empty lie it was, to listen to the fire’s crackles and sizzles invade the silence over her unbeating heart, to close his eyes and bathe in the last of her warmth, to breathe in the burning ashes to fill his lungs deep, and keep her within.  
  
He wanted to take her with him, immortality a terrible punishment for the cold, dark nights ahead, without her there. He wanted to hold on, to more than memories that would, in the dreaded long years of the hereafter, warm a vamp’s lukewarm body, reawaken his long dead heart, and invoke his vacant soul. In short, he wanted her, and failing that, a recipe to bring forth the surcease of sorrow, something that might soothe a shattered heart.  
  
He stared at the back of Dawn’s head. If he’d been miserable, then Dawn… He’d sworn to protect her, yet how would he even begin to safeguard her from the worst kind of pain, from inner turmoil? He’d never again have what he craved, his golden Slayer, but something to do to dampen the guilt that’d been eating away at him wouldn’t hurt.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
Giles continued his eulogy, elegant and moving, yet Dawn couldn’t register enough beyond the rise and fall of the words to grasp their meaning. How ironic, Dawn thought, that in the end, it was not the foretold forces of darkness that had brought down the Slayer. Not vampires, not demons, not troll gods or hell gods. It was love. It was her. How could she bear to say goodbye?  
  
Willow gave Dawn a gentle nudge forward, but the teen was not ready, not nearly. Tara stepped forward instead, brought out two long tapered candles from her purse, and set them at the head of the grave. Before she could strike a match, a lit lighter was thrust before her--Spike, bending to please, offering his trusty Zippo. She nodded, and he brought the candles to life, trembling fingers aglow before trembling flames.  
  
As silently as he had stepped up, Spike faded back. Tara began speaking, in a hushed tone, as if not to disturb a sleeping baby. Not wanting to miss a word, Dawn bit her lower lip and breathed deeply, slowly, holding back tears for the moment. Her mind, however, refused to settle, and instead of gliding on Tara’s gentle voice, floated to anything and everything else: The way the blades of grass yielded beneath Tara’s black Mary Janes but did not break. The way the casket fit into the open grave, so snug, contrasted with the thought of herself, after the witches have moved on, rattling away alone in her mom’s big house, like a dried nut in a too-big shell. The smell of eucalyptus wafting through the air, recalling a thousand childhood memories, dozens of picnics, on days much like this one, with mom and dad calling from the car, and Buffy and her pausing mid play, almost out of breath from their game of tag and from laughing, to beg for just another five minutes, pretty please with sugar on top. And being yanked back to the open grave, Earth opening up to swallow Her child, Her protector, the same way it had recently swallowed Buffy and Dawn’s mom.  
  
Tara’s voice broke, then dropped to a whisper. Something someone had said at her mother’s funeral. Curiously, it resonated louder than before in Dawn’s ears: _Your end, which is endless, is as a snowflake dissolving in the pure air._ _So beautiful_ , Dawn thought, _and profound_. But her grief-addled mind willfully rejected the beauty and the wisdom, because she couldn’t, no way, no how, see her sister’s death as anything but ugly and tragic and senseless. No Eastern philosophy could dissolve away the death and the associated pain. _Or,_ Dawn amended, _my sorrow, which is endless, is as a tear sinking into the freaking earth at a fresh grave. So, there._  
  
Then Tara was done and bashfully stepping back. Willow, stepping forward at the same time, swooped up her hand and laced their fingers together, and with fortitude borrowed from Tara, she spoke, too, letting memories wash over her. Of high school friendship and courage and finding purpose and Bronzing and the good times, the last of which Dawn found hurt more than the bad.  
  
Then Anya was suddenly there, the three of them in a huddle and Anya offering more tissues, all around, from her apparently bottomless supply, like one of those peddlers at a baseball game, carrying a ridiculous super-sized tray of popcorn and cotton candy and what else? Dawn couldn’t recall at the moment. Kudos to Anya with the preparedness and the keen eye to spot a need and the perfect timing and, oh, she was crying again, alone and--  
  
A solid set of arms pulled her close, into a chest robust like a wall of solidarity. She looked up to a blurred vision of Spike, his face wet too. “‘Lo, Nibblet…” he murmured against her hair, “Let it out, Spike’s got you…” His body was arched to envelop hers, as if to shield her from harm. His chin dug into the top of her head when he spoke, a point of comfort. In his strength she felt herself grounded, the tension draining out of her body to be replaced by an immense sense of relief. Relief that she had someone to cry with, and even more that Spike was not mad at her after all, for having caused the death of the woman he loved.  
  
Then she felt Giles patting her on the shoulder, his movements stilted, as if he was embarrassed to break his personal code of zero public display of affection, to betray the magnitude of his emotions. And as he seemed to deliberate on his next move, Xander strode up past them to break up the sobfest of the three women, whispering to Anya, “C’mere, babe,” and Anya poured into his arms. So did Willow, which meant he didn’t so much break up the sobfest as join it.  
  
Finally, all Scoobies, united once more, were reduced to blubbering, sniveling puddles of incoherence, and the conquest was complete.  
  
Ironically, Dawn was the first to recover, now that she had Spike as backup. She had so much to say, and nowhere to start. She had something prepared on a sheet of lined paper, the kind she used for school, with a thick margin at the top for the student’s name and three holes on the left for the binder. She had written and rewritten and crossed out her thoughts to the point of near illegibility, then dutifully replicated them on a mint sheet of paper. But it seemed silly now, before her sister’s fresh grave, to smooth out a sheet of neatly folded paper, and clear her throat, and enounce, loud and clear, as if reciting in front of the class for a grade. As much as it was laid out for everyone to see, grief, Dawn thought, was very much a private matter. A sudden clarity struck her: She would never be able to let go of her sister, say a real goodbye, and she saw no need to put up a charade for the benefit of her sister’s friends. They were mourning her, too.  
  
So she saved her private thoughts for a private moment, alone with her sister, and said simply, “I love you, Buffy. I miss you so much. I remember what you said on Glory’s platform: _The hardest thing in this world is to live in it._ I’ll be brave, and live, for you, to be worthy of your sacrifice.”  
  
She turned to the group around her. Softly, she fulfilled her sister’s last request, “Buffy said to give all of you her love.” Spike’s head jerked up; the unexpected message from beyond the grave not allowing him time to compose himself, to cover it up. Fortunately for him, everyone was too engrossed in their own grief to notice. “She said,” Dawn continued, “that we have to take care of one another now.”  
  
“Were those...her last words, then?” Giles asked, clearly making a mental note. Dawn nodded. “Thank you,” said Giles. “You’ve been remarkably brave.”  
  
She managed a meek smile, then turned to Spike. “Aren’t you going to say something to Buffy?”  
  
Spike hesitated, “Reckon much of what I want to say isn’t fit for company.” Dawn narrowed her eyes, and he added quickly, “But I did try my hand at composing a poem for her. Thing is,” he exhaled shakily, “when you write about slayers…every poem is an epitaph, every song an elegy. Life burning so bright ‘astride of a grave, the light gleams an instant, then it's night once more.’ That last bit’s from Samuel Beckett, who wrote as depressing as they come. Can’t compete.”  
  
“Night once more…” Dawn echoed. “Well, it’s good that you’re a creature of the night, then.”  
  
He couldn’t help but smile at his Nibblet’s quick wit. She was going to be alright. He thought for a moment, then recited from memory, substituting “she” for “he” to fit:  
  
_When she shall die,_

_Take her and cut her out in little stars,_

_And she will make the face of heaven so fine_

_That all the world will be in love with night,_

_And pay no worship to the garish sun._  
  
Dawn stared at him in shock and Spike shrugged. Giles supplied helpfully, his voice strained with surprise and curiosity, “Shakespeare’s _Romeo and Juliet_ , except with the appropriate pronouns.”  
  
“Hey, I also happen to know a poem or two for this occasion,” Xander’s voice rung out, a bit too loud. He cleared his throat, and solemnly, slowly--  
  
_It's the circle of life, and it moves us all,_

_through despair and hope,_

_through faith and love,_

_'til we find our place,_

_on the path unwinding._  
  
Anya was nodding pensively, and Giles frowned, but Dawn’s eyes met Willow’s. “Wait, is that from…the _Lion King_?!” Dawn snorted.  
  
“What if it is?” Xander countered. “The way I see it, Disney deserves a Nobel for the fine literature they produce.”  
  
Dawn was doubling over with laughter. Xander reached out and ruffled her hair, “Made you laugh,” he said proudly.  
  
“Hey, stop it!” Dawn batted his hand away. “Dork!” she retorted elegantly, but there was no sting in her rebuff. Her smile said it all. And everyone else was smiling with her. _Maybe,_ she thought, daring to hope, _just maybe, everything_ would _be all right._  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
In a tranquil grove on the outskirts of Sunnydale, hushed by weeping willows and incensed with eucalyptus, outside the confines of the town’s myriad cemeteries, and where the myrtle flowers didn’t reach, lay a warrior's last resting place. A tombstone, simple but ornamented with flowers and protected by an ancient spell invoked in the tears of friendship and family bonds, proclaimed its hero laid to rest below:

Buffy Anne Summers

1981 - 2001

Beloved Sister  
Devoted Friend  
  
She Saved the World  
A Lot

 

~ To Be Continued ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm rather fond of this chapter. I'd love to hear what you make of it.


	5. What Doth Strengthen and What Maim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Giles makes a surprising discovery about Spike and ends up rather the worse for wear, and Willow takes on extracurricular activities.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is taken from the poem “Bards of Passion and of Mirth” by John Keats, with an excerpt quoted at the beginning of the chapter. Rated PG-13.
> 
> Beta'd by the absolutely brilliant SlayerDaniWho and All4Spike!

**Chapter 5. What Doth Strengthen and What Maim**

_Here, your earth-born souls still speak_  
_To mortals, of their little week;_  
_Of their sorrows and delights;_  
_Of their passions and their spites;_  
_Of their glory and their shame;_  
_What doth strengthen and what maim._

_\-- From “Bards of Passion and of Mirth” by John Keats_

 

“I’m hooome!” Dawn shouted from the entrance, performing her usual circus act of shedding her backpack and jacket in one smooth move while shutting the door with a kick. A wave to dismiss Janice’s mother, who had dropped her off and was waiting outside in her idling car, concluded today’s impromptu addition. The car drove off.

“Tara! Willow!” Her volume increased to the top of her lungs. Without waiting for a response, she made a beeline for the refrigerator in the kitchen. The fridge light snapped on as she rattled the door open to consider her options: a third of a carton of milk, a roasted chicken under clear wrap, a Chinese takeout box with congealed leftovers that had become all but unidentifiable, two bottles of soda rolling sideways on the door, and a tub of _I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter_.

Through the dripping condensation of the plastic wrap, she tried to engage the chicken in a staring match, but the chicken only played dead. _Meh._ She reached for the milk instead, and gulped down most of what was left in the carton before tossing the not-exactly-empty container back in the fridge.

Kicking the fridge door shut behind her, she continued her call. “Tara! Willow! Anybody home?” After a few seconds of silence, she added tentatively, “Spike?” Getting no response, she muttered, “Where is everyone?” as she ran up the stairs two at a time and looked in all the rooms, even Buffy’s.

Empty.

Nobody was there to witness her deflate like a flat tire onto Buffy’s bed and try very hard not to cry.

After a long time, she sat up to face the still-empty house. Her efforts to hold back tears had not been entirely successful. “Fine! I can be not-here too! Watch me!” she announced to the silent walls, storming down the stairs and out the door.

It slammed behind her.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The door creaked inward, apparently unfastened.

“Spike? Are you around?”

Giles’ words, as well as his knocking, went unanswered. Deciding that it would look quite silly to be seen addressing an open crypt door in a cemetery, he stepped in and secured the door behind him.

“Spike?”

His voice echoed in the vaulted crypt and he briefly considered backing out to return at a more opportune time, but the truth of the matter was, a visit with Spike was bound to be awkward anytime--well, _ghastly_ might be the better word. And once there, he’d rather just get it over with. He wouldn’t be in Sunnydale long.

He’d timed his visit an hour before sunset to catch the vampire in his lair, suppressing that itch from years of Council indoctrination to pull out a stake and drive it home, past a satisfying crunch of ribs and through an unbeating heart.

He had a good aim, unlikely to miss. And that itch...was so like an instinct now, it almost short-circuited the logical part of his brain, overriding his understanding that Spike was an exceptional vampire.

Thank God for _almost._ What a relief that he hadn’t quite fossilized into the over-zealous rigidity of Quentin Travers, who held fast outdated notions in polarizing black and white against evidence of a nuanced reality staring him in the face.

The earth moved, shoving a Persian rug into an arch.

“Rupert!” Spike’s head and the top of his bare shoulders poked out from under the rug-concealed trapdoor. He sounded taken aback by the identity of his visitor. “Give us a mo’--jus’ need to get decent for company.”

He disappeared without waiting for a response. As Giles waited, curiosity got the better of him, and--strictly for academic interest only, he insisted to himself--he examined Spike’s worldly possessions.

There really wasn’t much, just what Giles imagined as the bare necessities of modern unliving: TV, armchair, sofa, mini-fridge, and a couple of end tables, all tattered or jury-rigged to suggest they’d been salvaged from the dump. The pillars of candles and Persian rugs provided a hint of warmth, but interior decoration held no specific interest for Giles.

That left the bookcase, which literally made him take a step back. _Spike...reads?_ Giles had no doubt that he could, just...the mental image of the Big Bad, curling up with a book by candlelight after a spot of violence at Willy’s seemed…rather incongruent. Was his punk rocker, devil-may-care attitude all just a cultivated act? Giles surveyed the shelves: epic poetry by the likes of Homer and Dante, works of the three canonical Latin poets Virgil, Ovid, and Horace, and a collection of annotated Greek mythology took up the top shelf. Impressive.

Various works of Shakespeare, in mismatched sizes and formats and showing different degrees of wear-and-tear, cobbling together a surprisingly complete collection, pretty much filled out the second shelf. On the bottom shelf and tightly packed were volumes bearing venerable names such as Edna St. Vincent Millay, Dylan Thomas, and Pablo Neruda. And in one end, offset by a heavy skull bookend, arranged chronologically as only a scholar would, instead of alphabetically, were poetry from the “Big Five” of the Romanticism movement: Wordsworth, Coleridge, Lord Byron, Shelley, and Keats.

Giles didn’t know what to make of it.

Spike’s library, excepting modern poetry, was an exact subset of Giles’ own collection, which, in _his_ case, was a reflection of his Classics background. Some of the same books had followed Giles since his rebellious days at Oxford. He’d had to wrestle with the plausibility of Spike the white hat, a redemptive, soulless vampire. He was not quite ready for the notion of Spike the poet.

The memory of Spike quoting _Romeo and Juliet_ at Buffy’s funeral took on a new light. Giles had assumed at the time that Spike had looked up an appropriate stanza, perhaps with the help of one of the Scoobies, and drilled it into his head just for the occasion. He had similarly written off Spike’s demonstrated familiarity with the St. Crispin’s Day Speech before the battle with Glory as something that all Brits knew. Staring at the bookcase, he suddenly came to the conclusion that in both cases, Spike had pulled the excerpts out of his repertoire on the spot and recited them from memory.

Giles felt slightly better upon his discovery of the _Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe_. From one macabre romantic to another, that was Spike through and through.

There was a sudden dull sliding sound--from dragging the rug over the trap door, Giles deduced. He turned on the spot, and came face to face with Spike, light-footed as a cat and swift as only a vampire could be. In the warm flicker of candlelight, the sharp angles of Spike’s face might have been softened by his upturned mouth, but the stirring shadows rendered his expression unreadable. Were those specs of gold flashing in his eyes? Giles couldn’t be sure. His lips parted to let escape a faint, involuntary gasp, for although he had no fear, he was not foolish enough to repudiate the threat of a master vampire in the familiar ground of his own lair.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The compact book collection held a number of occult classics and rarities: _De Lamiis et Pythonicis Mulieribus_ , a 15th century German treatise on witchcraft and feminine power; _De praestigiis daemonum_ , the 16th century demonology bible in its original Dutch, with a volume of modern French translation next to it; the Cambridge translation of the 9th century _fengshui_ classic, _Esoteric Pronouncements of the Green Satchel_ , with a companion volume of interpretation; the medieval _Oracula Sibyllina_ , a book of prophecies ascribed to the Sibyls, oracular women of ancient Greece.

Some of the books were worn down to the binding, yellow with age, preserved in acid-free, archival cellophane sleeves. Some were leafed with notes in neat, tight handwriting, almost doubling in girth from the meticulous additions. A couple of relics that had witnessed the rise and fall of civilizations of antiquity might fetch a handsome sum at reputable auction houses, and significantly more on the black market. Others had been perused with enough frequency that the leather covers had darkened with oil from contact, and softened and polished to an attractive sheen.

Willow closed her eyes and ran a hand over an entire row of mixed-material book spines, listening for the soft hiss of depressed paper dust jackets and the crisp crinkles of ruffled cellophane. So much knowledge bound within, so much power hidden in the text, as a riddle, a verse, a ludibrium, or an acrostic, wanting to be freed, _waiting_ to be wielded. By someone capable and fearless and _worthy._

Someone, Willow thought with absolute clarity and total certitude, like her.

She arched her back for a deep inhale, wanting nothing more than to imbibe all the power the books could offer, assimilate it, lock it within her. Either by misplaced trust or negligence, Giles had foregone protection spells on the collection, relying instead on a simple lock and key to restrict access. Which was hilarious considering anyone with half an interest in it would have to be an accomplished witch or warlock. The magicks Willow had accumulated in her repertoire would make Spike’s breaking-and-entering bag o’ tricks look like child’s play. No twisted bobby pin or tell-tale marks of forced entry; she had dismissed the physical barrier with a trivial incantation and a mere wave of her hands.

She banished a stray self-deprecating thought about the situation: she was such a bookworm, sneaking into the Magic Box like a thief only to covet thy neighbor’s library. When Giles left, he would no doubt strip the Magic Box of his personal collection and Council property, thus depriving the rest of them of the valuable research material. What a shame. Willow affected a pout on that thought. Never mind that the struggle between good and evil on the Hellmouth would simmer on, flaring now and again. It must have lasted millennia before them, and would go on to outlast them all.

Unless, of course, the recently intensified evil forces had all been held in check by the Slayer, and her sudden absence would quickly tip the scale in the wrong way. That would be of the major bad. Willow felt her resolve harden, her motivation renew. Challenges had that effect on her. She had a calling too--she sensed it then. She had already outgrown her shy, wallflower phase, but the world had yet to witness just how much it had underestimated little Willow. Nobody else in her circle was going to die, not even in a hell dimension, not if she could help it.

She refocused on the work at hand. Her locator spell had led her to the Magic Box. A quick glance revealed the books to be organized first by subject matter, then in alphabetical order, as Giles was wont to do, given any collection of books numbering more than three. Must be an occupational hazard for an ex-librarian. There was a brief moment of confusion and panic as a volume-by-volume scan of the “A” portion of the magic books section failed to yield the _Aldaraia_ , as Willow had hoped. She wouldn’t screw up a simple locator spell. That was the magical equivalent of the freshman intro class.

She took out her loyal notebook--this one color-coded purple for magic--and double-checked the title: _Aldaraia sive Soyga vocor._ Translating that on the fly from Latin to English, Willow muttered, _“Aldaraia, also called Soyga_.”

The satisfaction of the aha moment was further bolstered by the sweet discovery itself. There it was, the _Book of Soyga_ , a plain hardback, sans dust jacket, right after _Songs and Incantations of Ancient Maya. Go me!_ Willow smiled to herself as she pulled out the reproduction of the 16th century tome of rituals and enchantments, self-proclaimed to hold the truth of life and rules of nature.

The last book she had acquired, the _Voynich Manuscript_ , had been a terrible disappointment. A historian with a lifelong interest in mysticism, and a crackpot, Willow thought bitterly, had declared it the greatest transcendental grimoire of all time. That superlative had prompted Willow to dutifully track down a turn-of-the-century facsimile on eBay, outbidding book collectors and art historians alike with a pretty penny, only to end up with a useless and unsightful paperweight. The content had been written in a language she didn’t recognize on sight and failed to crack with her brilliant hacker mind, backed by the greater wisdom of the Internet.

It had been an auction rookie mistake. She should’ve had the foresight to request content pictures from the seller. But her unbound enthusiasm over the accidental discovery of the fortuitously-timed auction had overruled any caution. And instead of boring, time-consuming research in order to boost her confidence in the utility of the book, she had so cleverly used the time to develop a reusable computer program that altered the auction site software to permit a final bid from herself only, thus guaranteeing her victory.

Too soon, however, still high from the thrill of testing out her computer program and bubbling with pride over turning a nail-biting bidding war into a sure thing, she was forced to admit her oversight. Instead of being the Holy Grail, this manuscript of grandiloquent claims had turned out to be nothing more than a mirage, a diversion on the road to true solutions. Willow hadn’t let that temporary setback corrode her resolve.

It looked as if now she was back in business.

Opening to a random page to inspect, she eagerly studied a figure drawing of a cluster of dots, and frowned at its caption. The alphabet was of Latin construct, as it should be, but the words were utter gibberish.

She sank down to the floor, sitting cross-legged and leaning against the bookcase. She recognized none of the words, which was saying a lot. Not to brag about her self-taught Latin, but after all the Scooby research parties and her diligent and systematic devouring of every spell book she could get her hands on over the years, she wouldn’t blink to go up against a Classics professor in an Archaic Latin slam, had such things existed.

Willow tried a revealing spell to see if the text would reorganize itself into simple, straightforward Latin. No such luck. Intrigued, she unclipped a pen from the front pocket of her backpack without taking her eyes off of the book, and set to work.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“I’d gladly lend you that book”--Spike indicated the one in Giles’ hands with his chin, then tilted his head to read the title--“except I’d wager you already have it in your library. Don’t you, Rupert?”

Spike had taken care to make himself presentable, double-checking that his all-black ensemble was clean and undamaged by self-destructive bar brawls, and his voice ungarbled by alcohol. His self-image barely bore the embarrassment of repeat rescues by the Watcher. His reputation could not survive tales of William the Bloody’s inability to handle his liquor or fight his own battles. That he was anxious to make a good impression on the Watcher for reasons unrelated to his Big Bad image, he dismissed like a spent cigarette.

“Indeed.” Giles waved Dante’s _Purgatorio_ at the bookcase, the source of his current bewilderment. “I must say I’m impressed by your book collection. You have quite a…sophisticated taste.”

Despite Giles’ calm demeanor, Spike could hear the quickened thumping of his heart and scent the intoxicating albeit faint perfume of his fear in the air, which made his fangs itch to drop. Chip or no chip, white hat or demon core, Spike could not override a hundred and twenty years of conditioning as a vampire. The Pavlovian triggering of appetite by proximity to human, though far from overwhelming since his days as a fledgeling, was automatic.

He reached for Virgil’s the _Aeneid_ to call forth his humanity. Would Virgil, who spoke prophetically of gods and men, bestow upon him, by all accounts a lowly creature of the underworld, an act of benevolent divine intervention? Would Virgil, who seemed to regard fate above free will and one’s own desires, deny him a fighting chance for redemption? Would those around him? He wondered.

He opened the _Aeneid_ to a dog-eared page and let his eyes glide over the familiar Latin, and watched with smug satisfaction as Giles’ jaw dropped _further_. He’d been able to fool everyone into underestimating him. Time for William the Bloody Reformed Vampire to show off.

“What, you ‘spect to find stashes of _Playboy_ and _Guns &Ammo_?”

Giles parted his lips for a reply, then seemed to think better of it.Spike cocked one eyebrow. “Got those too. Well, not the ones about guns. Never could abide them. Bit like cheating. Seeing as I’m never without my weapons.” He flashed his fangs to elaborate, gleeful when Giles frowned.

Except that with the chip forcibly implanted in his head, his good ol’ days of intimidating humans had come to an end. His bumpies had been reduced to a show of empty posturing only, similar to putting on a suit of armor...made of paper. There was cold comfort in hanging around oldies, those who still recalled visions of his demon unleashed in all of its glory.

“And push comes to shove, I much prefer the assurance of a well-crafted axe in my hand: resilient hardwood haft, reinforced single-bit steel head. It’s all about the sensation when you hit target.” He swung his hand through air with confidence, stopping just short of the bookcase. “Can see how you’d make that mistake about my preferred reading material, though. A soulless demon like myself couldn’t possibly harbor a secret interest in Homer and Shakespeare or books at all when, in fact, it’s Slayer who--”

The sudden thought of Buffy attacked his defenses like a landslide. No longer able to muster the mental capacity to prop up the façade of casualness he had so meticulously put on for Giles’ sake, he instead let it crumble down like a house of cards, falling where they might. Impressing Giles had suddenly lost its appeal. He didn’t feel like showing off; he wanted to hide. Aware of the Watcher’s eyes on him, he returned the volume of Virgil to the shelf to stop the trembling of his hands, and finished softly, “--it’s Slayer who...didn’t read.”

“Yes,” Giles replied in matching tone, hands gliding over familiar titles as if to recall memories behind each--memories, Spike suspected, of happier times, of a resilient youth. Instead of meeting Spike’s eyes, he appeared to be fascinated with his hand, now draped over _King Lear_. “Buffy’s idea of enlightenment was tips from this month’s _Cosmo_.”

They both chuckled at that.

Spike pulled out his cherished half bottle of _Macallan 18_ from behind the tome by Edgar Allan Poe--who, he spared a random thought, had known something about drinking. _Oh, Buffy!_ Would he ever get to the point where thinking about her wouldn’t feel like being gored by a Kungai demon's Tak horn? Eternity might be deep and wide, but he feared that even as dust, he’d mourn her loss and feel the pain ingrained in his demon essence, whatever that was. He resisted the urge to chug the bottle straight up-- _must appear civilized before our guest here_ \--and instead retrieved two chilled glasses from the mini-fridge.

“And the words she used sometimes”--Spike reminisced, collapsing heavily into his armchair, bottle firmly in hand--“you’d think she’d never cracked open a dictionary in her life.” He tipped the bottle over a glass for an extended pour, then downed the content in one gulp. He’d fought plenty of demons before and since, but no amount of physical violence would diminish his longing. He missed her quips and taunts that suited their dances together like music. Under his breath, he murmured, “Bloody adorable.”

Giles sent him a look and sank down to the nearby sofa. “You’re one to talk! A significant portion of your vocabulary is taken up by swear words.”

“Why, thank you, Rupert. Didn’t think you cared enough to notice. By the by”--he shifted uncomfortably--“‘preciate your coming to my aid at Willy’s. Din’t seem right to bring up at the funeral, but--much obliged.” He inclined his head at Giles, proffering a glass with a generous pour of whisky.

“Yes, quite,” said Giles ungraciously. Grabbing the glass, he took a long sip. “You pull that rot again, I’ll personally kick your pale vamp arse six ways from Sunday!”

Threats from Giles were nothing new, but the heat behind his words struck Spike as particularly heart-felt. He swallowed an automatic “Would like to see you try!” challenge, no doubt expected of him, a typical short-circuited retort from ego to mouth, bypassing his brain entirely.

Sensitized to the rawness of Buffy’s loss, he didn’t trust his feelings these days, but it _almost_ sounded as if the Watcher actually cared for his welfare. On second thought, it made sense that the Watcher would hold his self-destructive tendencies in contempt. He was a teacher at his core, and a self-reliant warrior against darkness. To him, the waste of unrealized potential, by giving in to one’s inner demons, must be the worst offense.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Spike chuckled. He had thought that nothing mattered anymore, but he was wrong. He still had more to lose. “Anyway, got the Bit to take care of, yeah? Cleaned up my act.” It felt liberating to come clean to Giles. He’d done it for Dawn, hadn’t he? Now all they’d got left was each other. No more, no less. And for Spike it would remain so, as he’d promised, _‘til the end of the world_.

“So I’ve heard. Reports from Willow noted your presence at Revello Drive every night since the funeral, looking after Dawn.” Giles’ tone was neutral as he watched Spike.

“Ah, got your eyes and ears on me, have you, Watcher?” He let escape a dejected exhale of air. So he was still not to be trusted, after all. He swirled the amber liquid in his hand, then downed a long swig. His day had started out with so much promise.

“On the contrary,” said Giles. “Willow seems to be under the impression that I expect regular updates on _everyone_ from her. It’d be flattering if not for the way she quietly ignores my express counsel, while putting on a show about yielding to my authority. As is, I find it…” Giles paused to sip from his glass. “Unnerving.”

“Hmm.” Spike took in this new information. He’d always pegged Willow as a dangerous witch with a latent thirst for power, unlikely to settle for the position of second fiddle for long. He didn’t know if he believed in auras or psychic readings, but there was something about Willow, a humming dark power attuned to the vibrations of the Hellmouth, that always set his demon on edge. In the presence of the boisterous Buffy, the Chosen One, she had been overshadowed and dangerously overlooked. Now, in the power vacuum of the aftermath… Spike thought it was high time someone else had picked up on it as well.

“You couldn’t possibly be confiding in me now, could you, Rupert?” He regarded Giles with suspicion. “Clearly ‘member being told my opinion would _never_ be wanted.”

"‘In the course of my life I have often had to eat my words, and I must confess that I have always found it a wholesome diet.’"

Spike laughed heartily, head rolling from side to side on the back of his chair. “Winston Churchill. Well, he’d know a thing or two ‘bout eating his words.” He raised his glass to Giles, then brought it to his lips and drained it dry.

Giles smiled warmly and returned the gesture, before taking a hearty mouthful from his own glass. Was he testing Spike’s knowledge? Either way, he seemed satisfied. “Good to have _someone_ finally get the references I make! Talking to these _children_ in California, I’m afraid to lower my IQ through osmosis.”

“Yeah, we Brits gotta stick together in this land of the colonials.” Spike poured himself another, and topped off Giles’ glass. “No decent cuppa to be had, that’s for sure. Except at yours, Rupert.”

Giles downed half the glass in one swig. “I’d trade Earl Grey for your beverage of choice here any day. Speaking of Merry Ol’, I won’t be long for the land of the, uhm, colonials, as you put it.”

Spike had known Giles would be leaving, but hadn’t expected the courtesy of a personal farewell from the Watcher. He felt vindicated, in a way, if an act of desertion could be wrangled to represent fellowship and acceptance. Nah, not the act, _per se_ , he reconsidered, but the forewarning thereof. As if they were equals. As if he mattered. Flustered, he wasn’t sure how to respond.

“And you thought it fitting to crown me the head of the farewell party committee?” He settled on redirection to humor. It’d served him well before.

Giles laughed heartily, reclining and putting his feet up the sofa. “Well, I shudder to think of the refreshments, but the liquor I trust will be top shelf?”

“Only the best for you, Watcher. Only the best.”

“And come by honestly?” he hastened to add, sitting up with the glass of _Macallan 18_ safely within his grasp.

“Oh, certain sure! An’ to be enjoyed responsibly.” Spike nodded, wearing his best innocent expression. Giles narrowed his eyes.

“But before I lose my train of thought, I’ve rather a proposition for you...

Spike sent the Watcher a quick glance: serious Giles was back. Quietly, he put down his drink, but covertly topped off the Watcher’s. The latter had recently witnessed him sloshed four-on-the-floor at Willy’s, which made it imperative he stayed reasonably sober throughout this conversation. And just to asseverate he was still evil, Spike relished the thought of turning the tables on the Watcher. By the look of it, he was already half way there.

 

~ To Be Continued... ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With the exception of _Songs and Incantations of Ancient Maya_ , which I made up for the alphabetical order, all the book titles mentioned in this chapter belonged to actual books. _The Voynich Manuscript_ , in particular, is a real mystery, in that the unknown alphabet used to write the medieval book has never been successfully decoded.


	6. One Link in the Chain of Destiny

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Willow, all alone, declares a little victory on a covert mission; and Spike, with no scheme in mind, makes two friendly connections. A continuation and conclusion of the plot arc started in [Chapter 5](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3625725/chapters/8722282).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is taken from a quote by Winston Churchill, included at the beginning of the chapter.
> 
> Beta'd by the fantastic DaniWhoSlayer and All4Spike. Rated PG-13.

_It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link in the chain of destiny can be handled at a time._

_\-- Winston Churchill_

 

Willow was getting nowhere with the _Book of Soyga_. She had selected and analyzed what looked to be a representative sentence in length and construction preceding the figure. Nine word-like segments, the shortest of which had two letters, the longest eleven, interspersed in a reasonable fashion. The words did not look artificial, as would a foreign work transliterated to be Romanized in appearance.  
  
The text also demonstrated adherence to a set of complex orthographic rules, characteristic of a real language. The letter groupings exhibited a number of patterns over and over again, with a somewhat regular distribution of vowels to be phonologically sensible. Some words, specifically a few short ones, showed up in high frequency, also true of most Latin-based languages. The punctuations, for what it was worth, were all the regular, familiar ones. In summation, she found plenty of evidence of a pronounceable language with a reasonable spelling convention, not statistically likely to be one of fabrication by anyone short of an expert linguist.  
  
Willow idly wondered which word of this mystery language mapped to the equivalent of the English “the”, the most common English word by far. Was it like Middle English to its modern derivative, as in Chaucer’s _Canterbury Tales_ , where the words looked funny, but made sense once pronounced? Inspired into trying a phonetic approach, she read a paragraph out loud according to Latin pronunciation rules, and the words rolled off her tongue in an unfamiliar clip, alternatively wispy and sharp. She struggled over back-to-back consonants, double vowels, and words with de-emphasized ending syllables. The resulting cacophony didn’t sound like any dialect she recognized.  
  
Willow was starting to sweat, figuratively and literally. Sneaking into the Magic Box after hours had the disadvantage of having the central air conditioning shut off. She’d come prepared with essential supplies: water, flashlight, notebook, Latin-to-English dictionary, laptop; but an electric fan would not have fit into her backpack. She shifted her weight uncomfortably and considered her next move.  
  
If the book had been encrypted using a cipher, the most common algorithm would have been a substitution cipher, which replaced one or a group of letters with another. Cracking the code required performing frequency analysis and mapping high frequency letters in the encoded text to those in the target language.  
  
Willow flipped to the back of her notebook to scan through her cheat sheet of useful data: In the Latin alphabet, the letters of the highest frequency were _i, e, a, u, t, s_. She quickly entered a couple of pages from the middle of the Book of Soyga into her laptop to calculate the character distribution. She stared back at the results: right at the top of the frequency matrix were _e, u, i, a, s, t_ , pretty much the same letter frequency as Latin. That suggested that the letters were not substituted, but merely scrambled.  
  
A transposition cipher? Sucking air through her teeth, Willow leaned back on the bookcase. That would be decidedly more challenging. A solution could take days. It might continue to elude her. And if this turned out to be another dead end--  
  
_No._  
  
She would not give up a second time. She rubbed her eyes furiously, refusing to allow the stinging she felt there to turn into tears. Tirelessly she had worked, relentlessly she had pursued, while everyone around her moped and sighed and wept and fled, regretting the past, wasting the present, and giving up on the future. It all added up to a big heap of heart-felt, touching, miserable, pathetic nothing. Down a slayer and everyone suddenly forgot how to live on the Hellmouth, as if all those cemeteries Buffy used to patrol held only daisies and not corpses. People died all the freaking time in Sunnydale, usually attributed to supernatural causes. That was the brutal truth. The only thing that improved their chances was the presence of the Slayer.  
  
And the only solution to their current predicament was to bring Buffy back.  
  
Was she the only one who was clear-eyed and clear-headed enough to realize that? She wanted more than anything to once again see the old Scooby Gang spring back and jump into action, the way they always had in the face of adversity. Instead, the only action going around seemed to be a downward spiral of wallowing in self-pity, leaving her working out the details of the solution on her own.  
  
Come to think of it, the whole thing had been terribly unfair. How many times had Buffy saved the world? And the world apparently wasn’t going to lift a single finger to help save Buffy. Willow had had no luck with the search for the resurrection spell; everything had to be done the hard way. She had no doubt she could do it, but she thought that all the karma points Buffy must have accumulated bailing out the world should account for something.  
  
Distilling rage into focus, Willow grabbed the _Book of Soyga_ and once again, studied each word in the open spread, scanning for anything that sparked recognition. She brightened when she saw, sprinkled among passages that meant nothing, _esse_ (“be”), _tenet_ (“holds”), _rotas_ (“wheels”), and _ibit_ (“go”). She had to blink to read ibit, though--her eyesight must be failing--because at first, she thought she’d read _tibi_ , Latin for “yourself”.  
  
Then a lightbulb went off in her head. Rotas backwards was _sator_ , or “sower”, and _esse_ and _tenet_ were both palindromes, the same forward and backward. Could it be…?  
  
She tested her theory on a random gibberish word, _eallets_ , which when read from right to left revealed itself as _stellea_ , “stars”.  
  
Grinning from ear to ear, she tore through her backpack to come up triumphantly with a compact mirror, and pressed it--with a trembling hand, whether from excitement or nerves she couldn’t tell and didn’t care--perpendicular to the opened page. Like magic, familiar Latin phrases, whole sentences, no, the entire page flew out of the mirror image to form a cohesive narrative. Willow fell back laughing like an idiot until she was lightheaded and beginning to see stars. It appeared that portions of the book had simply been recorded backwards.  
  
“Am I good or am I good?” She asked the book. She was so ecstatic she forgave on the spot the grandstand scribe who must have either sought relief for his boredom or had one hell of a twisted sense of humor. Either way, she took it as a sign of divine approval. Her efforts had paid off.  
  
Boosted by her victory, she traced a finger down her notebook for the next grimoire on her list: the first volume of _Mafteah Shelomoh_ , or the _Key of Solomon_. Purported to be authored by King Solomon himself, which was highly dubious, it was irrefutably held as the origin of numerous rituals for invoking spirits and summoning the dead. Her Hebrew was a bit rusty, but she would manage. She had muddled through all those texts on practical Kabbalah just fine, and they had been long-winded and equally high on the cryptic meter.  
  
If the _Key of Solomon_ truly dated to medieval times, however, a modern copy might prove to be unreliable due to errors and omissions through generations of duplication by hand, and due to mistranslations based on secondary or altered sources. The result was not unlike a game of Chinese whispers, with each step departing further and further from the origin, until it was all but unrecognizable. This, more than the true identity of its author or authors, worried Willow.  
  
She sighed, lips pressed into a thin line of determination. Beggars could not be choosers. She needed to find a copy first, then make a judgement call about the trustworthiness of its content once she’d reviewed it. With that thought, she shifted onto her feet, stretched her legs, and stepped in front of the “K” section of Giles’ books.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
“Getting back to the matter at hand”--Giles paused, waiting for his thoughts to catch up--“there may well come a time when--when my resources may yet prove to be of assistance.” His impending departure did not change his force of habit to be thorough. He tried to recite the 7 Ps from training. Was it “Prior Planning and Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance”? He tried to think of other P words in their stead: _practice, proper, patience, potential, prophecy, prayer, plight, plaintiff, predicament, pounding pain…_  
  
He massaged his temples and reigned in his digressing thought. “Until then, I would not object to, uh, being kept abreast of the potential dangers, albeit from five thousand miles away.” The Council blended military discipline with academic rigor, encouraged youthful optimism while drilling age-old practices into its operatives. And Giles had been the _crème de la crème_. He was not in the habit of leaving situations unwatched, business unfinished. He rooted around in his pockets and felt out a business card, and laid it on the table between them.  
  
Spike glanced at the card intently, as if beholding a curio, but didn’t pick it up. Giles considered what this lack of action meant.  
  
“Am I to be a spy for you, then? On my own comrades? For a deserter?”  
  
The jibe was expected, juvenile and befitting of Spike, Giles reminded himself. He was really off his game if he let Spike get to him. Staring suspiciously at the glass in his hand, its content the seductive hue of honey, he felt rather than saw the swirling motion. It beckoned. Giles blinked slowly. He could’ve sworn it had been empty just a moment ago. “Do you consider them your comrades? Now that the battle’s ended?”  
   
“Not going anywhere. Told Buffy I’d protect li’l sis ‘til the end of the world, as you well know.” Spike’s pain and regret were laid out in his face like an open book. How did he manage to cheat at poker with a face like that? Giles wondered idly. Didn’t seem fair that a demon should appear so... _human_.  
  
“Reckon I’ve the rest of my unlife to atone for that buggered rescue on Glory’s tower with acts of contrition,” Spike continued, and Giles rushed mentally to catch up. “And this being the Hellmouth, Rupert, next battle’s jus’ ‘round the corner.”  
  
Yes, and the next one, and the next one, and the one after that. Endless as waves, the Hell’s army lay in wait, while the Hellmouth stirred, pulsating with its evil energy, bubbling with rife potential for disaster. Giles felt like a boy trying to turn back the tide of evil with a child’s water bucket, one scoop at a time, laboring ceaselessly, feet wet and freezing on the belligerent shore. He let his eyes close for a second, begging that mental image to dissolve. “Quite right.”  
  
Reassurance from Spike eased Giles’ own conscience about his pending desertion. He realized, as a surge of relief washed over him, how much he had needed it, depended on it. In Buffy’s absence, in her place, the Slayer of Slayers was to be their best chance at keeping evil at bay--how inexplicable yet oddly appropriate! He would drink to that.  
  
Something was gnawing at his consciousness, some important detail he must not allow to slip away--a matter, potentially, of life and death. Then it dawned on him--  
  
“Dawn.”  
  
Spike gave him a long look. “What ‘bout the Nibblet?”  
  
“You’ll do all this…because of a promise?”  
  
“Told you I--” Head tilted, eyes narrow, Spike started again, “What’re you getting at, Watcher?”  
  
Giles considered an oblique inquiry, then abandoned the exhausting exercise as rather unbecoming of their little tête-à-tête. “I need to ascertain that you have not transferred your previous affection for Buffy to Dawn.”  
  
“Transferred--”, Spike might’ve blanched if vampires could. “Are you off your bloody rocker?!” Giles thought he heard a rumbling growl. “She’s _fifteen_!”  
  
“No younger than Buffy when Angel--”  
  
“I’m no sodding pedo! That’s Angel’s MO. Come to think of it, I’ve a bloody bone to pick with you. What kind of Watcher sits back and allows my grandsire, a two-hundred-and-forty-year-old vamp with a history for kiddie kink and torture to become a fixture in the life of his teenage Slayer?”  
  
Giles bit back a ready-made response about the soul, considering present company to not take too kindly to it. Keenly aware of his failures, he let the remark go unchallenged. Spike was cursing under his breath, something about turning over a new leaf only to be met with cynicism and distrust, while the Great Poofter, with an unproven track record, had enjoyed undue good will and--  
  
“Shut up, Spike!” Giles said automatically. “Quit being so melodramatic. It’s my duty to be certain of your intentions. If you’ll stop whingeing for a second, you’ll have noticed that I trusted you enough to ask you face-to-face, instead of proceeding with the full presumption of your ill intent!”  
  
“Well, thanks ever so!” grumbled the vampire unconvincingly.  
  
“If you will set aside your indignation for a moment, I would like to set up, with your assistance, a contingency plan for the duration of my absence. And--” finally catching Spike tipping the whisky bottle over the glass in his out-stretched hand, he said, “I’m going to ask you a very serious question, and I need an honest-to-God answer: just how many times have you refilled my glass?”  
  
With a smirk, Spike started counting, bending his fingers one at a time. When he got to his other hand, Giles groaned.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  
  
She had the distinct sensation of floating in mid air. Weightless. Guiltfree. Calm. Safe. No wind whipping her hair against her face, strands sticking to tear tracks, as on Glory’s platform. No burden to sink her under, leaden limbs propping up a helpless body, equating her life with the world’s death. Not enough forward momentum to be flying; too soothing to be stationary. Was she...being rocked? Cradled like a baby? … _Mom?_  
  
As soon as the thought entered her mind, the peace shattered, and she was falling, falling…  
  
She gasped, an arm shooting out to latch onto something, anything. “Mommy?” Her desperation came out between a shout and a sob.  
  
“Shhh-- It’s me, Nibblet.”  
  
Disappointment battling relief, Dawn opened her eyes. It was pitch black.  
  
She blinked. It took a moment for the grogginess to recede. Spike was lowering her into bed, the feeling of cold mattress pressing into her body rather unassuring. She must’ve fallen asleep downstairs, and he’d just carried her up. He continued to hover awkwardly, until she noticed the fistful of leather jacket in her hand and relaxed, then tried to smooth out the rumpled lapel. “Sorry,” she mumbled.  
  
“Don’t worry about it.”  
  
She didn’t hear him move, and in the low light, she could barely make out his outline. “Okay, creepy much? We do own lights in this house.”  
  
A soft click, and then she was shielding her eyes from the abundant light that poured over her from the nightstand, squinting at Spike. She sat up and leaned away, retreating into the shadows.  
  
“Better?”  
  
“Not really.”  
  
Spike dragged a chair next to her bed and sat astride it, his arms resting on the back. “You wanna talk about it?”  
  
Dawn didn’t. She was sulking and wanted to go on sulking on principle, continuing to stew in anger about being neglected and abandoned. Coming home to an empty house was one thing, returning dejectedly to the same house after a bout of pointless-because-unwitnessed teenage rebellion, only to find it still empty and careless, and now dark, triggered a new wave of hurt. Then, adding insult to injury, she had fallen asleep on the living room sofa without dinner like a most pathetic latchkey kid… Was it too much to ask for a constant, responsible adult in her life? Never mind that Spike was there now. His presence did not remove the sting she still felt so vividly. She wanted to lash out.  
  
She went on the defensive, “What are you, Dr. Phil now?”  
  
“Oi! I’m much better looking than that pillock!”  
  
Dawn suppressed a giggle but couldn’t stop a smile.  
  
Spike smiled, too. “Where’re the witches? Dinn’t know I was s’posed to show earlier.”  
  
Dawn put on her woe-is-me look. Her bottom lip might have trembled in conjunction. “Out. Summer jobs. Wiccan meeting. Hot date. Pick one.”  
  
Spike seemed to be studying her. Tenderly, he said, “You eat yet?”  
  
Great. Now the vampire was pitying her. “I’m not hungry.” Her stomach, having not gotten that memo, growled all too disobediently at that moment.  
  
“Right,” he said, then jumped up, full of energy. “C’mon, I’ll make you dinner.”  
  
Spike, the very flammable vampire who had only mastered the microwave last year without making a bloody mess, was going to cook for her? This she got to see.  
  
“Okay,” she said, forgetting that she had resolved to mope and languish. She bounced down the stairs after Spike, ignoring the smirk at his lips.

 

~ To Be Continued... ~

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. Once again, all the book titles mentioned in this chapter belonged to actual books.
> 
> 2\. Writing in the opposite direction of the language such that deciphering it requires the use of a mirror is a real thing, called "mirror writing". Possibly the most famous person to employ "mirror writing" on a regular basis was Leonardo da Vinci.


	7. Source of My Virtues and My Crimes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the deception deepens: a plan is revealed, but not to all. Features: Unhealthy obsessions, conspicuous absences, Chinese food, and (abused) sports metaphors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is taken from a poem by Anne Brontë, with an excerpt included at the beginning of the chapter.
> 
> Beta'd by the incomparable DaniWhoSlayer and All4Spike. Rated R.

**Chapter 7. Source of My Virtues and My Crimes**  
 

 _That crowning object of my life,_  
_The end of all my toil and strife,_  
_Source of my virtues and my crimes,_  
_For which I’ve toiled and striven in vain,--_  
_But, if I fail a thousand times,_  
_Still I will toil and strive again._

_\-- from “I Dreamt Last Night” by Anne Brontë_

 

* * *

 

“ _Spike!”_

_At Dawn’s cry, Doc spun to face him, just as Spike pulled himself up Glory’s platform. So much for a surprise attack. The antique knife in Doc’s grasp gleamed, a sharp little devil. But first things first._

_He shot a quick glance at Dawn in a split-second assessment, otherwise pinning Doc with his focus. “Nibblet, it’s gonna be okay. Jus’ hang in there, alright?”_

_She was a tear-stained mess, the poor thing, bound at the end of the platform. His presence must’ve helped, though, for she nodded vigorously, and tried for a smile. Spike inhaled deeply for the scent of blood. None. At least she was free of injuries--small favors and all. Instead, he was hit with a wall of fear, heady and streaked with despair._

_It was a smell he would’ve relished not that long ago. It would’ve been an intoxicating combination had it been emanating from anyone else, and he still evil. On Dawn, it somehow made his stomach twist in a wave of nausea._

“ _This won’t take long,” he said, needing the reassurance of his own words._

_Doc flashed him a smile, made creepier by its serenity. “No. I don't imagine it will.”_

_With a roar and a slip of his vampire visage, Spike rushed him. Doc sidestepped with surprising agility, and Spike stumbled past, unable to halt his momentum. Before he could turn around, he felt the sharp blade of the knife embed in his back, deep, his body arching on impact. It hurt like a mother. He screamed._

_Clenching his teeth, he reached behind him, closing his fingers around the wet hilt. A hard yank, and the pain splintered, traveling up and down his body like jolts of electricity. For a second his brain couldn’t process the scream splitting his ears. Was that...him? Dawn? With a trembling hand he held up the newly gained weapon, and he decided it’d been worth it._

“ _You don’t come near the girl, Doc.”_

_Doc seemed to be deliberating, eyes darting between the knife and Spike’s face. “I don't smell a soul anywhere on you... Why do you even care?”_

“ _I made a promise to a lady.”_

“ _Oh. Well, I'll send the lady your regrets.”_

_Spike lunged, and Doc opened his mouth wide, his reptilian tongue shooting out to sweep Spike off his feet. Vampire speed was apparently no match for demon strength, and Spike found himself lifted up in the air, in a choke hold he couldn’t break. With his feet thrashing uselessly, he slashed at the tongue with the borrowed knife, repeatedly in quick succession. Then, quicker than an eye could see, the tongue unwound itself from around Spike’s neck to flick the knife into the air._

_That gave Spike a much needed opening._

“ _Not a chance, you sodding reptile!” he shouted._

_He gripped the clammy tongue and pulled with all of his might. Doc shuffled forward with a gurgle, his footing unsteady._

“ _I’d dust first!” Another pull in their tug-of-war, and Doc came into striking range. The miscalculation hit him the same moment as Doc’s fists. The bastard threw a mean right hook. Who knew? With his hands full, Spike retaliated with kicks, until Doc caught his leg mid strike, and twisted hard. Spike spun to land on his back on a jagged edge of the platform, which did no favors to his knife wound._

_Just a flesh wound, he thought, consoling himself. But he knew, from the way the wind whistled in his ears, resembling a girl’s shrill cries, to the way his body struggled to right itself, with Doc still raining fists on him, that he’d gone into the fight underestimating everything, except for himself. Just a vampire. Not a superhero. This, he realized too late._

“ _Poor vampire,” Doc said, as if reading his mind. “Are you ready to die for your conviction?”_

_Instead of a sharp sting, the taunt gave him a sense of clarity, the attainment of enlightenment. Nibblet was going to live. Buffy was going to live. They had to, because he wasn’t. Saving the world demanded a price, and he, the odd one out, fully expendable, would make a great sacrifice. “Better believe it!” he shouted in between blows. “Are you?”_

_With that he grabbed hold of Doc and rolled off the edge of the platform. Doc’s face, twisted with shock until realization crumbled into resignation, was priceless. However briefly, Spike savored his sweet victory. Dawn would be alright._

_He had one last thought in the free fall: that he was finally free, free of his sins, free of his cursed unlife, free of destiny’s cruel joke._

_Then the world dropped dead._

 

* * *

 

When the world regenerated itself, one sensation at a time, Spike did not trust it to open his eyes. Or maybe it was his eyes that he didn’t trust. Why would a dusted vampire possess sight at all? Or need it? Or deserve it?

He clung to the scent of the Summers women, his personal piece of Paradise, blissfully drifting on the edge of consciousness. If there was a Heaven for reformed vampires, he was sure that’d be it. Until hunger, that wretched daily reminder of corporeal weakness, of condemned fate, alerted him of his True Nature, and his eyes shot open--

\--and found Paradise to mirror the basement at the Summers house.

From his cot hugging one bare wall, he located his blanket, crumpled on the floor at the foot of the bed. Good thing he’d remembered to pull on pajama bottoms before bed, a habit quickly formed after he’d moved into the Revello house. It’d only taken one incident to convince him of its necessity, a surprise visit from Dawn that ended with ear-piercing screaming...from the both of them. A bloody wake-up call, that was. They’d resolved never to bring it up, thank the gods, but it was still days before Dawn could look him in the eyes again.

_Dawn’s eyes, wet and swollen and trained on him as if he were her sodding salvation, greeting him atop Glory’s platform--_

It was too much. Sitting up, he let his head drop, ran both hands through his hair, then interlaced them behind his neck, willing the image to fade. A hundred and forty days since Buffy jumped, and he was still assuming the brace position. Living in her house, he saw her ghost everywhere, in every cherished memory and fresh discovery, no matter how mundane: the stairs of the back porch, where they had sat, enemy to enemy, in companionable silence; a dust-bunny-infested pompom behind the spare bedding, providing a glimpse into her past life, a hint of greater sacrifices yet to come; a Christmas ornament screenprinted with an old family portrait, with Dawn bundled up into a baby burrito in the arms of a much younger, more exuberant Joyce, next to a man with a smug smile who he assumed to be Hank, and Buffy, just a wee tyke, beaming at the camera in pigtails with pink bow-shaped barrettes.

He needed a sodding exorcism to end the torment of his guilty conscience. Appealing to the ghost of the woman he failed, he said to the echo of his own voice, “Every night I save you.”

For all the bloody good that did.

 

* * *

 

The egg roll was doing him a world of good.

Xander had found that his world view generally improved with the filling of his stomach, especially in the company of good friends, and even better when said friends were accommodating of his dietary preferences. Being the only male of the group had its perks, such as dining family-style. He was _not_ missing Captain Peroxide and the friendly macho posturing of trying to out-spice each other with the over-application of Sichuan hot sauce--absolutely not.

“Anyone want the last egg roll?” He made a move for it while tossing up a cursory offer. It was halfway to his mouth when the three women shook their heads in tandem. Score! “What’s in it, anyway?” he said in between bites. “It’s _so_ good!”

Anya had the answer ready. “MSG!”

Xander sighed in appreciation. “Delicious, deep-fried MSG…” he said in between bites, tipping the empty egg roll container just in case a sneaky egg roll was hiding under the flap.

“You love it so much,” said Willow with a smirk, “if you could, I bet you’d _marry_ the egg roll!”

Anya’s eyes lit up. Uh-oh. “Hey! Speaking of which--” She sat up taller and reached for Xander’s hand.

“Speaking of which,” Xander talked over Anya, occupying his hand by grabbing the moo shu pork, “I think I’ve had enough egg rolls.” Anya looked murderous. He was going to pay for it later. Could they tell he was panicking? He racked his brain for a convincing segue. “And why are we having our usual Sunday Chinese, delicious though it is, at the Magic Box instead of the house, and on a Saturday night? And where is the Unevil Undead?”

Willow and Tara glanced at each other, looked away just as quickly, then put down their chopsticks in sync. That was a little creepy. Cute, but creepy.

Willow cleared her throat. “I’ve been thinking about life on the Hellmouth. Losing loved ones and strangers alike, year after year. Surviving demons and vampires and government conspiracies as if it was a normal part of life. Watching cemeteries expand beyond city limits. Aren’t you tired of all the deaths?”

Realization hit him like a ton of bricks. “You’re moving away,” said Xander, the moo shu pork suddenly losing its glamour.

“On the contrary,” said Willow, apparently startled that Xander had reached the wrong conclusion. “Xander, you may say that I’m all in. Uh, no more ground balls. I--I’m not going to strikeout looking. I may be a pinch hitter but I’m stepping up to the plate in the big leagues now. You’ll see--it’s going to be a whole new ball game!”

When nobody said anything, Willow continued, “Watch me throw the Hellmouth a curveball, hit it out of the park, and deliver a grand slam!” She thrust a small fist into the air. Tara peered at Xander and Anya in turn. Anya looked like she had added confusion to her rage. Willow waved her fist again, with extra conviction.

“Okay, Will?”

“Yeah?”

“First of all, no more baseball commentary for you.” said Xander. “You’re ODing on sports metaphors.”

Willow gave Xander a sheepish shrug.

“Secondly, I get it. Isn’t that why we rallied around the Slayer? We met her and with a collective heave of relief, we all cried, ‘Buffy Anne Summers, you’re our only hope!’ and pledged our undying loyalty to her and her cause. We’ve been fighting the good fight. We’ve even been winning, you know, big picture view. We lost Buffy, but we haven’t lost the fight.”

“But we can do so much more! Evil doesn’t play by the rules, why should we?” Impassioned and impatient, Willow jumped up. “We don’t have to take it. We don’t have to be resigned to death! We can be heroes!”

Xander leaned back. This take-charge Willow still took some getting-used-to. “Uhm, not sure with the recruitment vibe I’m getting from you. We’re already living the _‘Be all you can be’_ life. All we’re lacking is a uniform. What’re you saying, Will?”

An audible indrawn breath, then Willow dropped the cannonball: “We are going to bring Buffy back!”

 

* * *

 

No dream, no matter how vivid, was going to bring Buffy back. This, Spike understood logically. Emotionally, however, bloody logic can bugger off before he knocked it arse over teakettle with a mean left hook. He willed the lingering dream to scarper, while simultaneous cravings battled for his attention. He needed a smoke to occupy his fidgeting fingers. A pint of blood to ease his hunger, tame his bloodthirst. A half bottle of top-shelf scotch, not to ring in oblivion--no, he’d need five times that, easy--but just enough to dull the longing for a certain dead Slayer, like cocooning a wicked blade with a pile of fluffy little cotton balls. He had the house to himself--Dawn was staying at Janice’s for the weekend, and the witches were God-knows-where, so he could finally be himself, which was apparently succumbing to vices. Some vampire he was, to be bound by his physical frailties. Or was it his humanity?

The white hats always took it for granted, how he hastened to dance to their every tune, as if being a vampire was optional, and behaving according to his nature merely a lifestyle _choice_. They never appreciated how isolating it was for him to betray his own kind, how much sheer willpower it took to get him to walk side-by-side with those happy meals on legs, even if he was muzzled by the chip, even as he saw them as brothers and sisters in arms. Right, he’d like to clock a timer on how long Xander would last carrying out his daily activities with a box of pizza alongside him before he’d cave in and devour the whole thing, social norms be damned.

Spike put the brakes on the brooding. He was no bloody ponce. The chip was forced on him by the Initiative, but throwing his lot in with the Slayer, that was on his own head. He’d told the Watcher that he’d remain in Sunnydale, looking after Dawn, taking up the slaying. That was exactly what he planned to do, even if it meant playing house with the humans. Fortunately for him, no new Slayer had been called to replace Buffy in guarding over the Hellmouth, disappointing sodding Quentin Travers. Well, good. Spike was relieved to have no baby Slayer dog his steps, cramp his style. No new Watcher to win over, to convince that he was on the side of Light.

Truth be told, the Scoobies seemed to accept him fine, since it had been Buffy who had handpicked him for Dawn’s protection. They way they acted, it was as if the Scoobies had canonized her to sainthood. In the early days following her demise, Buffy’s words had been quoted like true gospel. The endorsement from Giles had put the last nail in the coffin of his domestication. He wasn’t going to brood about how much of their acceptance was due to necessity--someone had to look after Dawn, to help keep up the ruse that Buffy was still alive and kicking her spinning crescent kicks. The bot had been handy for slaying as they watched each other’s back, but despite Red’s best effort, the bot’s babysitting programming had been woefully inadequate. The combination of her lack of cooking aptitude and her propensity for pyrotechnics was second only to the Slayer’s own. Spike would rather chance setting his hand on fire than risk the bot almost burning down the house. Again.

Without Buffy, Red took over the group in the power vacuum. There were bits of uncertainty here and there, of discussions and objections, but with each passing day Red’s status as interim leader solidified more. Pretty soon it was taken as read. Spike and Willow were never impolite to each other, but by tacit agreement, gave each other a wide berth. Just as well.

Spike gave the future a passing thought. Not sure how much further their lot could keep up the ruse, but for as long as he could get away with it, he was going to see to it that Dawn had someone watching over her. A reformed vampire amounted to piss poor material for a homemaker, but they’d muddle through, wouldn’t they? ‘Course he was not going to be a gormless git and sponge off the Summers savings, or what was left of it. Right. No bloody chance of him going corporate and turning into a nine-to-fiver, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t get himself gainfully employed while keeping strictly to the straight and narrow.

The filtered sunlight through the basement window was making him drowsy. Without Dawn to occupy his time, he fell back into bed, thinking of Buffy as he always did before letting his eyelids droop, his breathing ease. Blood and booze and smokes could wait. Now, he hoped for a more pleasant dream.

 

~ To Be Continued... ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BTW, if you want to know where this story is going, here's a future scene with a resurrected Buffy, as a teaser: http://seasonal-spuffy.livejournal.com/502798.html Subject to change. Would love to know what you think.


	8. Boldness Be My Friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter takes place immediately following Willow's announcement in Chapter 7. Featuring: an Anya character study, Tara's surprise statement, Xander's body language, and what Willow has in common with vengeance seekers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter before the resurrection, which will start deviating from canon.
> 
> Beta'd by the wonderful DaniWhoSlayer and All4Spike. Rated PG-13.
> 
> Title is taken from Cymbeline by William Shakespeare.

**Chapter 8. Boldness Be My Friend**  
  
_Boldness be my friend!_  
_Arm me, audacity, from head to foot!_  
_\-- William Shakespeare, Cymbeline, Act I. Scene VI._  
  
  
Bad. Very bad. Very, _very_ bad!  
  
Anya mentally reprimanded the idea while glowering at Willow. That usually worked with misbehaving puppies.  
  
Beside her, Xander had gone completely still, from what Anya hoped to be shock instead of enchantment.  
  
“What?” Xander’s voice was barely a whisper.  
  
Willow seemed to relish the reaction she’d engendered. She beamed like a student who’d been handed an exam she knew she could ace--in other words, like the same old gloating Willow. “Bring Buffy back,” she said, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. “That’d get us out of the pickle we’re in!”  
  
Anya couldn’t find her voice. The first law of magic was, “Thou shalt not kill,” because the original Coven had not anticipated a witch stupid enough to attempt a resurrection, which would’ve been the zeroth law. Long misunderstood by mortals, the first law was less concerned with right and wrong than with respecting the balance in Nature. Good and evil, yin and yang, life and death--the fate of the universe was precariously guarded, kept safe, by the pull of such opposite but equal forces. Not to mention that some things were final, and sacred, and best left the hell alone.  
  
A thousand plus years as a vengeance demon and Anya knew this: the return policy on lives taken summed up to a complete and total nil. It had always been far easier to lose a life then to gain one. (Based on that alone, Anya knew that whoever thought that the Powers That Be were benevolent was naïve and due for a rude awakening.) People were born, people died, end of story. The circle of life, from the perspective of any one human, was strictly a one-way street. Resurrections were cosmic no-no’s.  
  
Case in point: the last time a human resurrection took place, possibly while the Powers That Be took a catnap, it resulted in a whole new religion, forever altering the course of human history, triggering countless bloodbaths and unending turmoil in the guise of holy decrees. One man’s life, stolen from the Powers That Be during a time of tumult, had to be repaid in tens of thousands. The consequences of the resurrection of Buffy Summers, a mystically-empowered warrior, in a long line of such prophesied individuals whose activation depended on the death of the previous champion, would be too grave to consider.  
  
Anya shuddered. “You can’t be serious!” she blurted out, voice cracking, “There are forces you simply don’t mess with!”  
  
Willow visibly bristled at that, then seemed to have thought better of it, and settled on a too-saccharine smile. It was an odd thing to observe, like the evolution of changing weather patterns.  
  
“I’m sorry you lost your powers, Anya,” chirped Willow, though she didn’t look the part, didn’t even bother to pretend. “But I know what I’m doing. I’m expert research girl--I always dot my i’s and cross my t’s.” She looked to Tara and Xander in turn, as if for corroboration.  
  
Anya’s hand fidgeted up to her bare neck, where for over a millennium hung the _Symbol of Anyanka_ , the pendant housing her demonic power. She prided herself on her successful assimilation to boring, fragile human life, but she was not going to pretend that she didn’t miss her powers, powers that ignorant _children_ like Willow could never fathom, let alone possess.  
  
“It’s not just the research. You’re dabbling in powers you don’t understand, with consequences you clearly haven’t considered.”  
  
“Huh,” Willow nodded, seemingly receptive to the idea. Disaster averted? Anya’s hopes were dashed when Willow said, “I didn’t know you were a practiced witch. I’ve never seen you at the Wiccan meetings. Why don’t you contribute a useful idea instead of booing other people’s?”  
  
How dare she! Biting sarcasm and bitter criticism was her forte! “Hey! That’s not fair!”  
  
Xander was at least on her side. “Now, just a minute, Willow,” he began, demonstrating finally that his blind spot when it came to Willow was not unbounded.  
  
It was the thought that counted, but as a modern woman, a business owner no less, Anya was no damsel in distress. She told Xander as much, “I could fight my own battles, Xander.”  
  
Xander gestured that he was “hands off,” and she turned to Tara, who usually championed Willow’s causes. “You OK with this? Don’t you think it’s wrong? What about the Wiccan code?”  
  
Tara seemed to shrink back from the implied accusations, as if stung. She drew a shaky breath, but when she spoke, her words were resolute and steady. “Everything about this is wrong. Interfering with the natural order of things is wrong. Using magic for personal reasons is wrong. Reversing a lifecycle is wrong.”  
  
“Then why--?”  
  
“Why would I go along with the plan?” she shifted uncomfortably, as if caught with her hand in the cookie jar. “Because Buffy didn’t die a natural cause. Because evil winning over good is perverse. Because sometimes, a healthy respect for rules means breaking them, with purpose.”  
  
That last one caught Anya by surprise. Tara--sweet, innocent Tara, whose aura probably approximated a double rainbow, perceived the world in gradations, replete with ambiguities? Then again, remembered Anya, Tara wasn’t all innocent, was she? She’d lived most of her life believing herself to be a demon outcast in a human world. That did things to a person’s psyche. Anya wasn’t sure she wanted to know how Tara came to live by that last rule. Willow, on the other hand, smiled appreciatively at her sweetie, as if Tara’s temporary disregard for the rules invalidated them wholesale.  
  
“Okay, so you’re respectfully shouting ‘No!’ to the rules. How do you even know that Buffy’s in a hell dimension?”  
  
Tara floundered, and Willow tamed an eyeroll-in-progress, which Anya caught anyway. How many catfights had she witnessed in her time? Willow was not nearly subtle enough with her contemptuous dismissal.  
  
“She died diving into a portal into Glory’s home sweet home, or have you already forgotten?”  
  
How could she? The head injury she’d sustained trying to shield Xander from harm had served as an instant recall for days, even with maximum-strength painkillers. Since then, with Buffy’s death plunging all of them into shellshock and mourning, there had been no real chance of escaping those dreadful memories. Plenty of denial across the board, sure, but forgetting? As Xander would say: no way, no how.  
  
Anya’s face must have reflected some of the horror that crossed her mind, for Willow deflated in front of everyone, her tone softening as she said, seemingly with effort, “I just--I just want things to go back to the way they were before.”  
  
“Oh, Willow.” Anya couldn’t help it. She tried to project a lofty judgemental tenacity, but felt herself unclench despite her resolve. How many times had she heard that very line?  
  
All the time in her previous life, wronged women had eagerly poured out their shattered little hearts to her, about reneged engagements, sweet-talking blaggard suitors, lying, cheating, waste-of-space husbands, and child-support payment-skipping ex’s. Vengeance had been the ultimate equalizer, and those seeking payback had come to her from all walks of life, dressed to match: in lavish Medieval surcoats with overflowing Oriental silk, modest linen cloaks overlaid with simple, well-worn aprons, imported Italian pantsuits expertly starched and pressed, or skimpy party dresses reeking of cheap cologne. She recalled the lovely silk dresses fondly, though perhaps not the way they’d been stained by their owners’ tears and that distinct odor of bitter disillusionment.  
  
The situation had never changed: the crime was sometimes trivial, sometimes atrocious, but the pain had always been genuine, the denial always the same. The truth invariably hurt, too, as Anya knew well, but it had been her job to give it to them straight. She’d done her best to put the poor dears at ease first, of course. She’d demanded from herself nothing short of perfect professionalism. They’d bond over homemade tea, boutique coffee, beer straight from the keg, and that one time, way too many Tequila shots from a well-tipped bartender (on which occasion joining her mark had turned out to be a personal mistake for Anya)...  
  
She would offer a sympathetic ear, a shoulder to cry on, a pat on the back, a drink for luck (though no more for Tequila Chick, bartender!), as the perfect combination of a good sister who watched out for their best interest, the kindred friend who offered unwavering support, and the Fairy Godmother of their dreams.  
  
At the end of the day, however, she hadn’t been able to--even with her D'Hoffryn-sanctioned powers, even at the peak of her abilities--make things the way they used to be. She sold the alternative--a vengeance wish--and sold it well (oh, did she ever!), not that most of the women needed more than a slight nudge to take the plunge. But even then, she had known that it wasn’t what the women had wanted, deep down. What they’d wanted was impossible.  
  
Case in point: Buffy was dead. (She seemed to have taken a lot of happiness with her, thought Anya, even though it had already been in short supply in this world.) The universe had moved on. Buffy would never _be_ again. Was it really that difficult a concept for humans to grasp? Were they really so insignificant that they couldn’t see beyond their own pain to the perspective of greater cosmic forces at play?  
  
She broke it to Willow with the bluntness of a thousand years of vengence practice, trying to snap her out of this streak of melodramatic sentimentality. “You know I don’t sugarcoat, Willow. Things will never go back to the way they were before. Buffy is dead--a worthy, Slayer’s death, and we need to move on, and live, and honor her memory.”  
  
But Willow wasn’t interested in perspective. She fought the harsh reality in front of her, willfully cocooning herself into an alternate world where the loss of Buffy could not be overcome, must not be withstood--even disregarding Tara’s hand on her arm that attempted to physically if not verbally hold her back.  
  
“No, you listen, all of you! A couple of years ago, I would’ve agreed with you--resurrection spells would’ve been too complex, too tricky for timid, little Willow. I was uncertain, uncommitted, uninspired, and untested. But I’ve come a long way.  
  
“I’ve been the Slayer’s right-hand witch, the group’s go-to spellmaster. I’ve single-handedly held off an entire army, and faced off with a hell god and lived to tell the tale. I can merge energies from multiple people without causing injury, and reverse an unknown curse to undo specific damage.” Here she looked in turn at Xander, Tara, and Anya, and pleaded, “I can do this: save Buffy. She was my best friend, and she didn’t deserve to die in a hell dimension.”  
  
She looked away for a second, and when she spoke again, her voice was hard, and swelling with resolve. “I can save her--I _know_ I can, but not by myself, not without your help. Will you help me? Will you help Buffy? Please?”  
  
It was the final “please” that did it.  
  
Anya felt cornered. If she had an Achilles’ heel, it was a desperate woman in need of assistance. Call it an occupational hazard, but after a few hundred years, it had became a full-blown, automatic--sometimes even preemptive--response. Within ten paces of a woman desperate for vengeance, her eyes would tear up, her hands would itch, her nose would tingle. After a thousand years, it had become a full-body experience; even her toes were twitchy with anticipation. Like seasonal allergies, except year-round.  
  
Anya might be without her powers, but not without her heart, and whatever was left of her demonic sixth sense could feel the rage and pain that radiated from Willow. She was clearly hungry for Buffy’s revenge, which at least would be justified. Buffy had been Heaven’s Chosen One, whose life and death had been shrouded in mysticism to begin with. Could she be an exception to the rule of magic?  
  
Sweet Tara, who had probably never hurt a fly and had been predisposed to follow Willow to Magicland’s equivalent of the end of the world, before the latter even opened her eloquent mouth to drum up support, was the first to pledge her allegiance. No surprises there. With a coy tug on their linked hands, she said to Willow, “You gave me back my mind and my life, after Glory tried to destroy me. I’ve seen how you use magic to heal, to restore. I’ll help you save Buffy.”  
  
Willow smiled, with a lover’s intensity, but a mourner’s kindness. As if someone had just offered her condolences at a funeral. Anya wondered if she hadn’t been a bit too harsh on Willow. Maybe it would all work out. Judging by how big a group of misfits they were, Heaven knows they couldn’t possibly have survived Sunnydale thanks to their own competency in fighting demons. Maybe the Powers That Be really did favor the Slayer and those in her circle?  
  
“Xander?” Willow prompted, switching off her sweetheart smile to one full of expectancy. It was clearly roll call time.  
  
“Well, you know.” Xander waved with perfect ambiguity, a floppy upward motion that could’ve just as easily been a dismissal as a surrender. He looked to Willow, then to Anya, as if caught between a rock and a hard place. “It’s magic, and, you know.” This time he threw up both arms, looking unwilling to elaborate, to commit, as if it were an obvious trick question.  
  
Anya took pity on him. “Xander, it’s okay,” she said gently. “I get it.”  
  
That opened the floodgate. All of a sudden words were spilling out of him. “I can’t not help, Anya. It’s the Buffster. I don’t understand magic--it’s all stinky herbs, abracadabra, poof, voila! But if there’s the slightest chance of saving her from a fate worse than death, of bringing her back from some God-forsaken hell dimension of torture, I can’t be Switzerland. I’d already chosen, back in high school. I can’t desert her now. I’m all in.”  
  
What do you say to that? Except to kiss him silly? So she did. “This is why I love you, Xander Harris,” she said with a trembling lower lip, getting emotional. “You can be real dumb sometimes, but you’re a loyal friend and a steadfast fighter. And you rock my world, you silly human. If you’re in, I’m in.”  
  
She leaned in closer to whisper in his ear, “I love you. I don’t want irreconcilable differences between us. Did you know? The great state of California consider those as legal grounds for divorce.”  
  
Xander flashed her an awkward smile, then stole glances at Willow and Tara, who were busy pretending not to be watching, all three of them red in the face. Which was both stupid and inconvenient. Humans got flustered by the smallest gestures of PDA, and they thought demons were the ones who couldn’t love.  
  
“Wait.” Xander’s brow creased. “Did you say ‘real dumb’?”  
  
“I said ‘I love you!’” answered Anya sweetly.  
  
“I love you, too!” came Xander’s automatic response, without a second’s hesitation. Good boy.  
  
Anya forced herself to relax. The rest of the group had moved onto idle chatter, and Xander was doing another round of going through the empty takeover containers. Oh, pleasantly-shaped Xander, who as a rule left no Chinese food behind. It was as if he had a bottomless stomach, and she’d wished that particular condition on one of her victims before to know how unpleasant that was.  
  
Speaking of unpleasant, Anya considered the current state of mess. They were to have a resurrection on their hands. If she had a tail, it’d be twitching now. On the other hand, this was Sunnydale, surely it was no stranger than some of the freak incidents that routinely plagued their lives. There was no way such rousing speech-making and almost-crying and uncomfortable displays of friendship and support and love could lead to the worst mistake of their generation.  
  
Right?  
  
  
~ To Be Continued... ~


	9. Long Days of Labour, and Nights Devoid of Ease

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Features: Spike&Dawn friendship, gratuitous quoting of the Great Gatsby, Xander put in an uncomfortable position (uh, not like that), Anya knowing just what (not) to say, Tara being a saucy vixen, and Willow's continued transformation. Rated PG-13.

**Chapter 9: Long Days of Labour, and Nights Devoid of Ease**

From the poem "The Day is Done", by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:  
  
 _Come, read to me some poem,_  
 _Some simple and heartfelt lay,_  
 _That shall soothe this restless feeling,_  
 _And banish the thoughts of day._  
  
 _…_  
  
 _Read from some humbler poet,_  
 _Whose songs gushed from his heart,_  
 _As showers from the clouds of summer,_  
 _Or tears from the eyelids start;_  
  
 _Who, through long days of labour,_  
 _And nights devoid of ease,_  
 _Still heard in his soul the music_  
 _Of wonderful melodies._

* * *

 

 

It was a rare Friday evening to find Dawn at Revello Drive, slaving away at her homework. To optimize for throughput she had devised a time-saving system of "divide and conquer." After assigning Spike the American Lit book report (by dangling the promise for a plate of the Bronze's spicy wings), she was currently tackling Geometry.  
  
"What's the rush, Niblet?" came Spike's indolent voice from the vicinity of the TV. Over the buildup of an intense flourish of music, a woman screamed. Something roared back, an inhuman sound, poorly done. Dawn marched over to the sofa on which Spike sprawled like a star-fish, grabbed the remote from his outstretched hand in one fluid motion, and firmly hit _power_. The black-and-white horror flick from TNT's _Friday Night Screamathon_ died with a flash and a whimper.  
  
"Oi! I was watching that! Got all weekend, haven't we?"  
  
"Nuh-uh." Dawn pressed _The Great Gatsby_ into Spike's hand, still outstretched but newly remote-free. "Willow said I could sleep over at Janice's tomorrow night if I get all my homework done tonight. Bet she didn't anticipate my secret weapon." She shot him a meaningful look.  
  
"Ya like her that much? Thought we were gonna continue broadening your comedic horizon with _Monty Python's Life of Brian_."  
  
Dawn thought he almost sounded hurt. Silly vampire with the silly insecurity. She resumed her seat at the dining table, and turned the page to the next Geometry problem. "Oh, uhm, rain check? Willow surprised me with the sleep-over arrangement! Said that if I keep my grades up, there'd be more rewards. This is just a preview."  
  
There was a delayed "Huh" from the living room, followed by silence. Spike being silent was Conspicuous with a capital C. Dawn could practically hear the gears grinding in his undead head.  
  
Unable to resist, she craned her neck until the back of said cranium came into view above the sofa. "What?" she asked. "You think this is some conspiracy to get me out of the house for the weekend?"  
  
He turned and their gaze connected for a second, then both of them burst out laughing. Dawn snorted.  
  
"You've watched too many episodes of the X-Files, Bit! Bloody conspiracy theory. Nice of Red to take an interest in you for a change."  
  
"Hmm." Dawn switched her attention to the next homework problem. Vertices of an octahedron. Eight. No. Six?  
  
With both of them busy at work, the house fell silent. For a while, there was only the sound of a page turning every so often from him, and that of pencil scribbling on paper from her.  
  
A sudden rustling, crisp and moving like a projectile, roused Dawn out of her concentration. Her head swimming with inverse functions, she barely registered a book flying across the living room to bounce off the wall with a dull thud, and Spike storming out the back door, his coat swishing behind.  
  
"Hey! Was that _my_ book?" She craned her neck to yell at him. All she got in response was the slam of the door.  
  
"Melodramatic much?" Mumbling, she tiptoed to the book, her curiosity getting the better of her.  
  
The book lay innocently on the floor, face down, the pages fanned out like a mess of leaves. _The Great Gatsby_ from her American Lit class, just as she'd thought. "Huh," Dawn said to no one in particular, "Not everyone digs Fitzgerald's style, but I've never seen _that_ reaction before."  
  
Spike was a destructive reader, always curling pages, folding dog ears, leaving cryptic notes and cigarette ashes behind, striking through the occasional typo with decisiveness and penning in the error-free word with finality. "I'm not a bloody poncy book collector," he'd said when Dawn had called him out on it. He'd had the nerve to give _her_ a lecture, after damaging school property. "A properly read book ought to look read, studied, pored over, _lived_. Not in unappreciated, untouched, sodding _mint_ condition." He'd practically spat out the word "mint" like the worst offense imaginable.  
  
So it was easy to track down where he'd left off. Especially—Dawn happened on it and snickered—as the page was slightly wrinkly, with damp ovals here and there. "Ugh, you'd better not have _cried_ all over my book!" she shouted teasingly in the direction of the back door, then said under her breath, "Dork."  
  
Hopping up a bar stool, she traced a finger over one vague oval, then scanned the passage underneath:  
  
 _So he made the most of his time. He took what he could get, ravenously and unscrupulously—eventually he took Daisy one still October night, took her because he had no real right to touch her hand._  
  
Dawn's heart thumped violently, and with the book tightly clutched in her hands—her knuckles white from effort—the words on the page jumped in sync with her pulse. She skipped ahead, leaping over phrases and whole sections, catching bits and pieces that grabbed her:  
  
 _He might have despised himself, for he had certainly taken her under false pretenses....He had deliberately given Daisy a sense of security; he let her believe...that he was fully able to take care of her.  
  
...He had intended, probably, to take what he could and go—but now he found that he had committed himself to the following of a grail….He felt married to her, that was all._  
  
"Oh. My. God!" She flew through the back door, knocking the bar stool over in the process, and sending the screen door into a brutal collision with the wall. With a trembling index finger inches from Spike's nose, she threw down her trump card of an accusation: "You...you slept with Buffy!"  
  
From his perch on the top step, Spike blew out a smoke ring, and cast her a sideways glance. It could almost be called languid, as collected as a cool cat. Which, because Dawn knew better, meant that he was feeling anything but. "Suss that out all on your own, did ya?"  
  
Spun, she searched her memories. Buffy was never good at keeping secrets; there'd be tell-tale signs. How had she managed to keep _this_ under the covers? "But...when?"  
  
He took a long drag from his death stick, then held his breath for the longest time, apparently lost in thought. And Dawn was struck by the fact that even now, mere memories of Buffy took his breath away, literally. When he looked up again with a glint in his eye, Dawn knew he'd been reliving a treasured piece of memory. His face was a distortion of bliss layered with despair.  
  
She thought he'd spill the beans to her sympathetic ear then. It wasn't like he had many friends to whom he could pour his heart out.  
  
But all he said was, "Not the kiss-and-tell type, Bit."  
  
Dawn sank down next to him, searching his face for clues. "You must miss her." Well, duh, so she hastened to clarify, rather lamely, "Like, a lot. _A lot_ a lot."  
  
The light was fading, something that her fabricated memory of years of Sunnydale living compelled her to retreat inside for safety before day fell to night. Behind her was an entire vacant house furnished with no less than a dozen comfy chairs and sofas, yet she was cozying up to a chain-smoking chipped vampire on a back porch step, struggling with an offer of sympathy for, morbidly enough, the death of _her_ sister. Her life was total absurd-o-rama.  
  
Spike, on the other hand, was all distracted action with no hint of rush: flicking off the stub, patting down pockets for his Zippo, lighting up a fresh one, then crushing the empty pack into a ball—a series of uncomplicated moves all carried out with expert efficiency that together, still managed to take a while. Finally, he ran out of things to do.  
  
"Well?" she prompted again, very softly. It was really for his sake, because he looked like whatever had caught in his throat was swelling rapidly.  
  
His breath hitched as he said, "Desperately." He wouldn't meet her eye.  
  
Something in his rigid body language told her he preferred to prop up the pretense on that last shred of dignity, so instead of giving him a hug, she awkwardly patted him on the shoulder. He neither flinched nor encouraged her, a dying cigarette dangling, unappreciated, between his fingers.  
  
But the tension was gone from his jaw, and, well, the worn leather, surprisingly soft under her palm, felt oddly comforting.  
  
There was hardly any view from the back porch, but they sat there, side by side, in companionable silence, until the rising moon, just a sliver shy of a full one, cast their merged shadow on the steps.  
  


* * *

  
For a few seconds after Xander delivered his practiced plea for help there was only the sound of rhythmic clicking as Anya leafed through a stack of hard plastic containers the size of sliced bread, in which suspended bits of yellow and orange and pink, like fishing flies. What the heck? Xander skimmed the billing statement paperclipped to the front of the box: toucan feathers. He shook his head. This magics thing is clearly for the birds.  
  
The sound cut out abruptly as Anya's fingers got to the end of the pile. She scribbled something in her notebook, then shot Xander a hard look. Not a good sign. He tried on his most innocent look and awaited the verdict.  
  
"That's a really big favor you're asking, Xander. When did you become Willow's errand boy?"  
  
He ignored the intentionally incendiary remark. He was a man with a mission. No way was he getting distracted. "Oh, come on, it's just one little phone call. Let Undead Boy play retriever with a demonic object, far away from here. Just for a couple of nights. What's the big?"  
  
Anya had moved onto the next item on the inventory shelf, kneeling down to count a tray of glass jars of a milky lavender blue liquid. He sat down on his haunches next to her, and sloshed a jar with interest. The liquid reminded him of the blueberry milkshake he'd had with his burger for lunch, except that its consistency ran much thinner than milkshake. Another mystery item in the Magic Box's storage room.  
  
" _What's the big?_ " Anya's voice rose an octave. She put the jar down with a crisp "clink". "The _big_ is my professional reputation! I'm dealing in magics supplies here. I can't afford to have my clientele think I don't know the difference between a Tak horn and an elephant tusk. Neither do I misfill my orders. You don't get repeat customers by being sloppy. You don't get _new_ customers if you develop a reputation for being sloppy. Not to mention components for dark magic like the Tak horn are well out of the the Magic Box's target demographic." Her tone was dripping with disdain, as if a customer not properly catalogued would be a terrible sin and a mishandled shipment a crime punishable by death.  
  
She stood up and scribbled in her notebook again, not bothering to look up as she said, "You can play messenger boy back to Willow. Getting Spike out of the way for the spell...she needs a better lie. I will not be a part of your _incompetent_ deception. I'm good at what I do, _always_." She shot an icy look to Xander, clearly lumping him in with the labeling of incompetence.  
  
There was no time to circle back to Willow, which would keep this to-do item from getting to-done. Keep Xander in the uncomfortable role of a ping-pong ball a little longer. A role he didn't particularly relish. He tossed the jar from one hand to the other, then back again. Fidgeting helped him think.  
  
"How ‘bout this. _We_ come up with a new excuse, you and me. We're _Team Xanya_."  
  
Anya chewed on her lower lip, and Xander wanted to take her in his arms and kiss her silly. Forget about the whole resurrection business, at least for a while.  
  
"OK," said Anya, her tone cautious. "But only because Team Ander would sound stupid."  
  
Score! Xander relaxed, tossing the jar high in the air with a flip of his hand. The extra energy sent it somersaulting, glistening pretty as a jewel as it caught a ray of the sunlight from the back window.  
  
"And quit playing with the container of horseshoe crab blood. It's very expensive."  
  
Xander's stomach did a turn, much like the glass jar fast on its descent. The jar hit his hands hard, and carried the momentum forward as he instinctively clasped it tight against his chest. It knocked him back. The upside? It jolted loose the rising lump in his throat, and forced back down the wave of nausea.  
  
Quick reflexes? Check. Stomach for magics? Not so much.  
  


* * *

  
Inhale. Exhale.  
  
Willow was ready. Not kinda ready. Not ready-ish. Ready like the sun was ready to rise and set, like the moon was ready to wane and wax. She flexed her fingers, shaping the air with intent, and felt her Wiccan power course through her veins. Produced by nature, backed by life, drawn from within, and shaped into pinpoint focus via her will. All that power, as old as the universe, just free for the taking. It felt kind of heady. Ready and heady...and rhymey. Uh-oh.  
  
Inhale. Exhale.  
  
She was ready. She was born ready.  
  
Timid, shy, geeky, helpless—that was her once upon a time, going along with the abuses of the world quietly, believing (in a secular sense) that the meek would inherit the earth. Now that she wielded the power, she was going to fight back, make things better, save the world. She might not have been chosen, but who said you had to be handed your destiny? If her destiny wanted to play a game of tag with her, then tag it was. Erh, or something like that.  
  
Point was, Willow was ready to shine like a no-longer hidden jewel. She was going to impress everyone, big time. How did the Slayer prophecy go again? _Into every generation a slayer is born: one girl in all the world, a chosen one._ Prophesied, set down and passed from generation to generation. Giles would recite the words like a prayer, sacred, ever-fixed, his voice gentle and smooth, as if afraid to disturb the underlying power.  
  
But it was about to change. And she was about to change it. To turn the table on Fate by taking it by its demon horns—because judging by its actions? Definitely demon—and by embracing her gift, and daring to challenge the prophecy, the myth:  
  
Into this generation a slayer would be _resurrected_ , relinquished by Death: one girl in all the world, _loved_ above all, such that her friends would rescue her soul from another dimension and restore her upon the land of the living. Buffy Anne Summers was the Slayer before, and would be the Slayer again. Ha, take that, erh, Death!  
  
And grinning widely, Willow wondered how she herself would be remembered by the Watchers Council. _From one generation to the next, the Slayer saved the world. Only one legendary, courageous witch by the name of Willow Rosenberg, has ever saved the Slayer by resurrection. Celebrated by covens worldwide, she—_  
  
"Personal delivery for one Willow Rosenberg! Veggie Delight, no onion." Tara breezed into the training room at the back of Magic Box, interrupting Willow's reverie. The newcomer balanced sagging paper plates of pizza in one hand, two cans of root beer in the other.  
  
The warm aroma of cheesy goodness mingled with the sweet perfume that was _Tara_ , awakening her hunger. In more ways than one.  
  
Mmm, heady and bready. And still rhymey.  
  
Dismissing her rhyme-o-rama mind, Willow relieved Tara of the soda cans. "Oh, delivery girl, I-I forgot my purse. However will I pay you?"  
  
"Weeell." Eyes twinkling, Tara sank down on the floor mat opposite Willow, mirroring her lotus pose. She playfully ran a calculating eye up and down Willow. "I also accept kisses. From the right person. But you'd better be one heck of a generous tipper."  
  
Willow switched onto her knees and pulled Tara in for a long kiss. Soft lips. Warm breath. Willow's stomach stopped doing its impression of the roller-coaster that had made her green with nausea at age ten. It made sense that Tara would calm her pre-spell jitters better than meditation.  
  
They parted after a long moment.  
  
"Was that generous?" Willow rested her forehead on Tara's.  
  
"Mmm, very."  
  
Willow reached to uncover the somewhat smooshed plate of pizza, but Tara's lips found hers again.  
  
"You forgot"—Tara whispered, a bit breathless—"your change."  
  
"Keep it," Willow kissed her back.  
  
A squeal startled both of them, and they turned, in sync, to see Anya beaming from the doorway. Over the pizza boxes and other things stacked high in her arms, her eyes were huge.  
  
"Oooh! I know this game! Xander's fond of it as well!" she said eagerly, as if thrilled to finally find common ground with Willow. "Except he doesn't accept kisses as alternative method of payment. He only accepts—"  
  
"And with that"—Xander appeared on her heels, swinging water bottles and soda cans, as if resigned—"we're back on the doorstep of TMI."  
  
Tara smiled politely and Willow picked up a slice of Veggie Delight to conceal a smirk.  
  
"Oh, please," Anya waived away Xander's caution like shooing away an unwelcome trespasser. "I don't buy this blushing bride act of yours. You're never shy when you ask for—"  
  
"Pizza!" Xander interjected. "I mean"—he coughed—"we brought you the rest of it."  
  
Anya didn't miss a beat, as if Xander had never interrupted her. "Pizza _s_ , plural. Left unchallenged, Xander would overeat past the obvious maximum capacity of his stomach. Then beg for tummy rubs for the rest of the evening."  
  
Tara cleared her throat, disguising a giggle.  
  
"And therein lies your mistake," said Xander, straight-faced. "You're reinforcing my overeating by rewarding me with tummy rubs."  
  
"Huh." That got Anya thinking and therefore no longer talking, to Xander's noticeable relief.  
  
He dropped down onto the mat. After securing two slices of pizza and folding them topping side to topping side into a makeshift calzone, he nodded at Willow. "How you holdin' up?"  
  
"Super!" Willow chirped. Xander raised one eyebrow.  
  
"Super duper?" she tried again. Now twice as convincing! Xander's other eyebrow joined its twin.  
  
"Sweetie," said Tara in that covert tip-off tone she used when whispering to Willow that her bra straps were showing, "you're rhyming."  
  
She hadn't realized that she had a tell. Good thing she didn't play poker.  
  
Xander pulled out Willow's open notebook from under one of the pizza boxes. Mouth full of pizza, he squinted at a line and read, "The one I seek I do not fear—"  
  
"Better fear the witch who came up with that spell!" Willow yanked the notebook out of Xander's hand and gave him a stern look. " _Never_ recite spells with your mouth full. I learned that the hard way." She gave it a second thought and amended, "In fact, Xander, for you, never recite spells, period."  
  
"Hey!" Xander protested, though he looked uncertain. "I thought it was a poem, what with your natural talent at rhyming."  
  
"It's a loose translation of an ancient resurrection spell," Willow explained, eager to share a fascinating aspect of magic. "The Latin source was in verse form. I emulated the rhythm of the spell in English to retain the energy of the original." She took a bite out of her pizza and continued, "Because magic isn't chemistry, and poetry is not about meaning, you have to strive for the spirit for the spell. Power is not a formula derived from the words of the spell. The words are merely a conduit for your will. The funny thing about translation is"—she couldn't help chuckling **—** "novices _always_ mistake verbatim for accuracy, and the potency ends up getting lost in the translation."  
  
Xander looked like he might need a translator to decode Willow's explanation. "You're clearly no novice, oh Master Willow." He thought for a moment, then turned to Tara. "Does that make you the apprentice?" With a funny voice he continued, "‘Always two there are, no more, no less.'"  
  
Huh? She exchanged a look with Tara, who shrugged; no idea.  
  
"Are you quoting some pop culture thing I have no way of being familiar with?" Anya piped up, her tone defensive. Still overly sensitive to innocent acts of exclusion. That-a-demon-turned-girl!  
  
Xander scowled at each of them in turn, then muttered in defeat, "I am _so_ under-appreciated. I need friends who _get_ my jokes."  
  
With an exaggerated sigh, he turned back to Willow. "You all set?"  
  
Time to come clean. "More or less." She took a deep breath and exhaled, trying to keep her voice light and her tone even as she said, "Just need a little blood from each of you."  
  


* * *

  
The unpleasant business of asking her friends for their blood now out of the way, Willow unravelled a thread at a corner of the sandbag and let the content pour out into a wide circle of protection large enough to fit four people inside. She sat down in the center to clear her mind and bless the space. Within the enclosure of the circle, the vibrations of the background energy faded from a shrill to a low hum in her ears. Low enough to tune out with a bit of concentration.  
  
Low enough that bits of a hushed conversation made their way into her ears.  
  
"Quit picking at it, Xander." Anya's voice. It continued, "I'm not going to band-aid your finger a third time."  
  
"Did you know this spell called for blood? _Human_ blood?" Xander spat out the last two words, as if he found even the words themselves distasteful.  
  
Anya tut-tutted. "It was barely a trickle. Be thankful that it didn't ask a life for a life. And then some. Buffy was more warrior than all of us put together, and magic usually requires an equal exchange…" Her voice trailed off.  
  
Xander continued, his voice as shaky as before, "I thought we were only here for moral support. I was prepared for the usual stinkin' herbs flumadiddle. You know, while not exactly top-shelf entertainment, magic can be pretty cool. But holy Las Vegas Batman, this is a far cry from Siegfried & Roy."  
  
"You know I'm a little thin on American pop culture references." Anya sounded as if she was pouting. "I don't know how to comfort you when you stop making sense."  
  
Willow willed herself to stop listening. She couldn't afford to question the spell, or the ritual, or the power coursing through her veins. Not now. Not after everything.  
  
All day long she'd been drawing energy from the earth into her reserve, and with every pull the world had responded with a ready give. She had the distinct impression that while she prepared herself for the incantation, the incantation prepared for her. The elements yielded. The powers flowed into her like rivers to the sea.  
  
A finality hit her sixth sense. This was meant to be. She was merely the conduit.  
  
Resurrecting Buffy was destiny.  
  
Willow couldn't see the sun through the square of frosted window, but she knew with mystical certainty that it was near sunset. She wondered briefly if it was what vampires felt, the call of the night, the surge of vitality. A full moon would rise tonight, marking the optimal time for rituals requiring significant mojo. She needed to seize that moment of transition, when the dominant energy of the sun yielded to the forces of darkness once again, when white magic and black magic converged to bend the division between worlds.  
  
When Buffy's spirit might be called to cross over the boundary between life and death, against the natural current, and come home.  
  
She nodded to Tara, who began setting four candles aflame and positioning them to each direction of Willow. The white tapers gave off a pale, flickering illumination, throwing everything into contorted relief. Tara's lovely face was a study of contrast in the candlelight, all wavering highlights and shadows. It took Willow a moment to realize that Tara was nervous, her body quivering in the quivering candlelight.  
  
"Baby, you okay?" Willow reached out to put an arm around Tara. Her fingers grazed something hard and lumpy, something hidden in Tara's jacket pocket. It felt like…  
  
Like the satchel Tara routinely used to carry ingredients for a spell-to-go. Lumpy because it was filled.  
  
As if struck, Willow's hand shrank back. She stared at her girlfriend, suddenly tongue-tied. Tara had come tonight prepared to perform magic, a purpose she had concealed from everyone. But...why? Willow would be doing the spell tonight. It was _her_ spell, and not to be territorial about it, but she'd been the one to locate the original incantation, translate it, piece together the ingredient list, and risk her neck to obtain every item on the list. Not to mention, she was the one with the power. She could feel the magic crackle between her fingers, just below the surface, ready to be channeled and directed via her focus.  
  
Tara caught Willow's retreating hand and laced their fingers together. "Just nerves." She smiled reassuringly. "I don't want you to worry about a thing."  
  
Tara was right, of course. The power of magic relied on faith. On conviction. On will. A flicker of doubt could undermine her ability to successfully perform the spell. Magic was a self-fulfilling prophecy, for both believers and nonbelievers alike.  
  
But what had Tara planned? Why hadn't she shared it with her? Willow couldn't dismiss the sense of unease that had crept into her mind like a...creeping thing, wiggling deeper, clawing at her consciousness to pay attention to it, and to its mutinous message.  
  
She shook her head, and visualized slamming the door shut on that part of her brain that harbored dangerous, elaborate thoughts of a treacherous nature. There was no time to get into this. As Tara continued the preparation with practiced ease, Willow made a decision to trust Tara, even if Tara hadn't trusted her enough to share. Once Buffy was back, everything would be fine again. They'd gotten into a depressive mood with the mourning, but it'd all end tonight.  
  
She would see to it.

 

~ To Be Continued... ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The event discussed in Dawn and Spike's conversation takes place in my Season 5 one-shot, ["Enough" (NC-17)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3544100), also posted on AO3. You didn't think I would've referred to it without writing all about it, did you?


	10. Folly Is An Endless Maze

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We pick up right where we left in Chapter 9, featuring Spike on an out-of-town errand, and the casting of the resurrection spell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hard R rating for graphic violence. I don't usually describe violence in detail, but if you recall, the casting of the spell got out of hand in canon. I'm casting different spells here, which I wrote, and this will become important later on. Bear in mind that Buffy will be coming back wrong (in a different way), in this AU story.

Title is taken from: "The Voice of the Ancient Bard" by William Blake  
  
_Folly is an endless maze,_  
_Tangled roots perplex her ways._  
_How many have fallen there!_  
_They stumble all night over bones of the dead_  
_And feel they know not what but care;_  
_And wish to lead others when they should be led_  
  


* * *

  
Spike’s DeSoto roared up to the bay of gas pumps flanking the deserted 24-hour convenience store. The sun had just set, and the broken neon sign proudly blinking “24-ho” gave this out-of-the-way stretch of the back roads that forlorn feeling. Never a vamp to play by the rules, he’d left right after Anya’s phone call that afternoon, in pointed defiance of the death orb in the sky. One vamp’s fatalistic inconvenience was another’s exhilarating challenge. And he didn’t make a hell of a name for himself by unliving in caution.  
  
Spike patted down his pockets for money, glad to be in the middle of nowhere so that nobody would witness William the Bloody stoop to a personal new low. Road trips used to be a hell of a lot more fun when fellow drivers at rest stops served as happy meals on wheels, and affording to keep the DeSoto’s petrol tank full was nary a concern when money was just a flash of fangs away.  
  
Traveling according to the rules of the sodding white hats, on the other hand, was at best inconvenient. Filling up his black beauty at the advertised petrol price like an honest vamp was going to be bloody highway robbery, for fuck’s sake. And not the fun kind. And at worst...well. All these dark, out of the way places through quaint little towns that made prime locations for committing premeditated murders, and he had to restrict his diet to the contents of the cooler currently melting unapologetically in his backseat. It was a bloody waste.  
  
In search of an adequate sum, he came up with a crumpled take-out menu from his back pocket. He vamped out to better read the address he’d scribbled down in a hurry on the back. Paradise, Nevada. A blink-and-you-missed-it area that had the nerve to be unincorporated next to Sin City. A good five and a half hours from Sunnydale if you drove at the speed limit, but why would he do that? He could probably pull off four and a half, each way. Then it was just the simple matter of marching up to the front door of the tosser who’d had the misfortune of getting the wrong merchandise shipped to him from the Magic Box, and offering a full refund in exchange for the safe return of the dark magic ingredient _arachnocampa luminosa_ , whatever the bleeding hell that was. It could probably be done in a single night, unless he ran into trouble and had to duck for cover while the sun was high. Even then, he’d be back before Monday.  
  
Fact was, he was cranky. The job itself he didn’t mind; he’d been a hired demon a time or two when he’d been bored or needed the cash. Granted, the lack of potential for violence made this particular assignment a lot less attractive, but he could always make his own fun. Plenty of demons in Sin City, after all. Bound to be a fight or ten in it for him.  
  
He didn’t mind doing Anya a favor either. As Scoobies went, she was all right. And half a grand for a simple retrieval job that didn’t involve risking his neck or straying from the straight and narrow? Not too shabby, either. Bagged blood didn’t exactly grow on trees, and he couldn’t risk overtaxing his poker buddies or they might turn extra motivated in figuring out that he’d been palming cards. Showing a little financial responsibility and contributing to a household fund for Dawn’s well-being, on the other hand, could help demonstrate that he was a changed vamp, or so Anya had self-servingly persuaded him on the phone. Besides, the timing couldn’t be more perfect. Dawn was away on a sleepover, so he’d been in search of a diversion to occupy himself for the night anyway.  
  
And with that thought, Spike finally figured out what had been bothering him. It was all too bloody perfect. Any other old night, he’d be refusing straight-away on account of needing to mind Dawn. Anyone but a Scooby begging a favor or trying to overpay for his services, and he’d immediately surmise a devious plot of dubious intent and decline, citing a conflict of interest or of schedule. And appealing to his shaky moral grounds? Never would’ve flown if not for the utterance of Dawn’s name, his one Achilles heel.  
  
To service the Magic Box’s customers, Anya had access to a network of suppliers, handlers, and couriers, of both human and demon persuasions. Granted, the standard protocol would’ve taken a couple of days to arrange, but there was no need to tap into the unproven wild card that was Spike. Anya always stepped cautiously where her money was concerned. This was an unnecessary and uncharacteristic risk on her part.  
  
Sod that. Spike smelled a rat. Throwing the handful of crumpled bills to the back seat, careless where they might land, he started up his DeSoto and pointed it back in the direction of Sunnydale. There was enough petrol left to get him home yet. He let out an amused laugh and cracked his knuckles in anticipation of action. His night had just upgraded from a dull chore to an exhilarating mystery, and he’d be damned if that didn’t get his blood flowing.  
  
Someone had tried really hard to get him out of the way, and he intended to find out why. Anya had some ‘splaining to do.  
  


* * *

  
Anya had a point. Sparing a little blood in exchange for a living, breathing Buffy should seem like the bargain of the century. But try as he might, Xander could not let it go. By his experience, only the baddies ever wanted to shed human blood. The Scoobies were definitely on the side of the Light. This was good magic they were about to do here, rooted in Wiccan flower power, not some freaky back-alley voodoo devil-worship. They were still dedicated to the mission of helping people and saving lives. So why was his spine a-tingling and his left eye all twitchy?  
  
Xander was still absentmindedly rubbing his band-aided finger when Tara came over and called for the formation of the spell circle. “Time to rescue Buffy!” Her tone was so...light and casual, as if she was announcing some routine boring event, like dinner or the arrival of mail.  
  
Xander cut short his conflicted pondering to heed the call to action. He was no philosopher. He had no interest in a profound and prolonged moral discourse. Nor was he Hamlet, who was wishy-washy personified, prince or no prince. (Not to mention, yammering on and on to a skull was surely a sign of having a loose screw. Even if—Xander recalled fondly—“borrowing” the skull from Biology class for their Drama class project had been kind of fun.)  
  
No. Xander Harris was all action man. Thinking too much was bad, for thinking in his case led to fear, and fear...well, as Yoda wisely stated, fear was the path to the dark side. He’d known Willow since his toolbox was still made of plastic and the hammer would squeak when he hit it. When it came to magic, a subject he knew diddly squat about, a little trust in his best friend the Super Witch seemed like a sensible thing.  
  
His conviction renewed, he marched over to the circle where four burning black candles guarded Willow, and plopped himself down next to her.  
  
“Whoa, black sand!” He observed with interest, dipping a couple of fingers in the circle, and letting a pinch of the black sand sprinkle down. It sparkled, as silicon should. “Fancy. Black candles. Black sand. Don’t tell me there’s a dress code.” He winked at Willow.  
  
“Uhm…” Willow grimaced with unease, as if deliberating what to say.  
  
From behind him Anya scoffed and said, “Which is really ground up dried scarabs?” She leapt into the circle with an elongated step, giving the dried bug dust a wide berth.  
  
“Correct!” chirped Willow, with forced cheer. “A hundred dollars to Anya. You even remembered to answer in the form of a question.”  
  
Xander rubbed his tainted hand on his cargo shorts, suddenly lightheaded and queasy. Good thing he was already sitting down. First horseshoe crab blood, now scarab dust. Magic clearly had it in for all God’s creatures great and small.  
  
Oblivious to his discomfort, Anya stared at Willow through narrowed eyes. “Don’t jest about money. It’s not funny. Wait until you have to work to earn a living, and you’ll see.” She dropped to her knees and sat back.  
  
When Xander found his voice again, he asked, “Will, do I even want to know?”  
  
As Willow hesitated, Tara chimed in, “To ancient Egyptians, the scarab symbolizes creation and rebirth in the cycle of life. It’s also associated with _Khepri_ , god of the morning sun. We’ll be drawing on the power of creation for the resurrection spell tonight, and calling for the protection of the newly risen sun against forces of Darkness.”  
  
“Can we maybe hold off on the Q&A until after _I_ do the spell?” Willow’s voice was tinged with more than a hint of annoyance as it lingered over the word _I_. “Buffy’s only getting deader while time’s a-wastin’.” She shot a warning glance at Tara, of all people.  
  
Someone was touchy. A case of too many witches spoiling a spell?  
  
The question that’d just popped in Xander’s head was too urgent to ignore. He blurted out without thinking, “Why are we doing the spell _here_ , in the _Magic Box_ , anyway? Shouldn’t we be candlelighting the cemetery where Buffy’s not resting in peace and sprinkling the bag o’ magical bug dust on her tomb? You know, since she’s over _there_?”  
  
Willow sighed in exasperation. “ _Now_ you want to talk about it? Before, you were all like”—her voice dropped an octave, apparently in a Xander impression—“‘You’re the boss, Willow. Spare me the details.’”  
  
“Yeah, well, that was before you called for a not-so-voluntary donation of blood, and dumped dead bugs all over the floor of Anya’s shop. Who do you think will get the super fun joy of vacuuming _this_ up after all’s said and done?” Xander gestured wildly around them, not entirely sure about the source of his anger yet unable to hold back any longer.  
  
With the tone of an adult at her wit’s end responding to an ornery child’s incessant questions, Willow pleaded, “Just trust me, okay? I’m going to be teleporting Buffy’s soul from _another dimension_. Do you think I’m going to sweat the last couple of miles between the cemetery and the Magic Box?”  
  
“Uhm, no, probably not.”  
  
“There’s no better place. The mystical signature of the Magic Box acts as a focal point for drawing in energy. The supply room offers an encyclopedia of magical ingredients, plus the actual encyclopedia. Anything we might need in a pinch. There’s already a protection spell in place to guard against dark spirits. Besides, we wouldn’t want to get interrupted by rising fledgelings attracted by the scent of fresh blood, would we?” At Xander’s silence, she tilted her head and cast a sideways glance at him. “Sheesh. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re chickening out.”  
  
Tara and Anya exchanged a meaningful look. Apparently Xander the Chicken was a popular idea.  
  
“Me? Chickening out?” Xander laughed. It sounded ridiculously high to him. “No chickening. I don’t even _like_ chicken. I’m more of a steak and potatoes guy.” He wasn’t sure what he was saying anymore, but his mouth was like a runaway train, skipping all scheduled stops, including his brain. “Chicken breast—too dry. I’ve never been known to be a breast man myself. Well, actually, that last part—”  
  
“Uh, Xander?” Tara interrupted.  
  
“And you wonder why you don’t have more friends…” Anya stage-whispered.  
  
“Sorry,” muttered Xander. “I...got spooked by the blood. I don’t deal well with things that I don’t understand and magic is large with the not-understanding for me.”  
  
He took a moment to collect himself and considered the alternative. Except there was no alternative. This was the only way. Resigned, he threw his hands up in the air. “It’s all details compared to bringing Buffy back. Let’s do it.”  
  
At that, they all joined hands.  
  
Willow took a slow breath and exhaled. “Ready to bless the circle, Tara?”  
  
“I’m with you,” came the even-toned reply.  
  
As one, the two witches began chanting, their combined voice calm and steady. Over the unfamiliar cadence of Latin, Xander felt a surge course through their linked hands. He flinched, then nodded decisively as Willow gave his hand a reassuring squeeze before letting go.  
  
“This is it, people,” Willow warned as she trained her gaze on each of them in turn. “From this point on, no interruptions. If you break the circle, you break the spell, and nobody breaks the spell except for me. Understood?”  
  
Everyone nodded and murmured agreement. Willow cleared her throat and began to chant, alone this time, her words steadily rising in tempo and in volume. After a moment she dipped two fingers into the shallow bowl of blood before her, and traced a crimson circle onto a small mirror. The surface of the mirror rippled, which, judging by Willow’s unflinching expression, was all hunky-dory. Xander’s band-aided finger throbbed in pain at the sight of the blood.  
  
He was just beginning to zone out when he noticed the blood disappearing from the mirror, like mist clearing in sunlight. Whoa, trippy.  
  
Willow tipped the entire bowl of their commingled blood over the mirror, a string of Latin words on her lips. The surface of the mirror dipped slightly, draining the blood into its invisible reservoir.  
  
The candles’ flames elongated and began to flicker wildly, straight out of a cheesy horror movie, throwing everyone and everything into sharp relief. Meanwhile the air around them stilled, condensed, and _congealed_ , pressing down on Xander’s body with all of the comfort of wet cement beginning to set. A dark halo developed around each of the flame and spread, absorbing instead of emitting light, until all four halos met in mid air and cast their merged gloom over the entire room.  
  
The creep factor was simply too high for an immature joke of, “Who turned out the lights?” A child of the Hellmouth after all, Xander had never been afraid of the dark _per se_ , but this _unnatural_ darkness that’d descended over them made his hair stand on end. It oozed and contracted, pulsating to the flickering of the candles as if sentient. Xander had the distinct sensation of being watched by _it_ , a shadow of something sinister and powerful.  
  
Wasn’t Willow supposed to be calling up a sun god? This felt as far from sunshine and rainbows as, well, night from day.  
  
With scant light from the back window for illumination, he was just able to make out Willow tipping an unmarked bottle over the mirror, its content a liquid dark and thick and foul-smelling. That was wrong on so many levels, Xander thought. Where this magic beeswax was concerned, ignorance really was bliss.  
  
He stole a glance at Tara, who maintained a look of quiet intensity as she observed Willow, her body leaning forward, poised for action. Anya, on the other hand, had her head tilted at an angle that was half way between curiosity and concern.  
  
Finally Willow ceased her preparations. There was an edge to her voice now, an effort, with the desperation of an appeal and the authority of a command. Xander imagined a battle of wills, with Willow’s body being ground zero. A terrifying thought.  
  
In time Xander became aware of words, _English_ words, that emerged in his mind without first going through his ears. It took him a moment to realize they constituted Willow’s spell:  
  
_Atum, god of creation,_  
_Spirit of the setting sun,_  
_We beseech you_  
_At your day’s journey’s end._  
_May you grant us passage,_  
_To lead to one of our own._  
_Let us follow in your footsteps_  
_Through the Underworld._  
_Your light be our guide_  
_Our blood be your price._  
  
Their blood as payment? And here he thought the currency of the Underworld was kittens. Or was that just among Undead Boy and other unsavory characters in his circle? And why was he thinking about Spike anyway? He yanked his focus back to the magic translation in his head. But the words did not reveal their secret to him, and he followed without comprehension.  
  
At long last, the incantation came to a halt. There was a slight hesitation on Willow’s part as she made eye contact with Tara, but no words were exchanged. Xander watched the byplay, positive whatever had transpired was important. But what did it all mean? He held his breath in anticipation.  
  
With her eyes still fixed on Tara, Willow gave up a mere whisper, like the dying breath of a defeated warrior. But the words that burst into Xander’s mind in tandem screamed of pure agony, drowning out every other sound and sensation. As in a badly dubbed foreign film, the message came out distorted and syncopated, and it was only with effort that Xander realized what Willow had uttered:  
  
_Atum, our guide, name your price!_  
  
Sheer terror invaded Tara’s face, and judging by the shape of her lips, she had to be shouting, “Willow, no!” but all Xander could hear was an indiscernible shriek tearing through the air.  
  
Flashes of light slashed through the darkness, sharp as a knife, freezing images of chaos and horror like a camera on a repeated timer. When Xander remembered to breathe again, he gulped down oxygen with greed. For a moment his own violent inhales and the drumming of his racing heart threatened to drown out every other sound.  
  
Out of the darkness a pair of hands reached for him, hands that bore fresh injuries. And as he watched in horror, more cuts, shallow and long and precise, with the skill of a practiced surgeon, and outlined in blood, appeared on Anya’s hands, traveling up her bare arms and disappearing under her shirtsleeves. Stunned, he watched without seeing, hurt without understanding. Anya’s shirt darkened under his gaze, in patches of dark red, and eventually it dawned on him that she must’ve been bleeding from wounds concealed by her shirt.  
  
They grasped each other in mirrored shock in the dim room, until both of them blurted out, “You’re hurt!” And it occurred to Xander that some of the pain he felt was physical. Checking his own body for damage, he found the same type of slashes covering his exposed skin: hands and arms and legs too; here and there and everywhere, repetition without pattern.  
  
Definitely a bad day for cargo shorts.  
  
“Willow, you have to stop!” Tara’s sobbing plea went unanswered.  
  
That was when they noticed Willow, on her knees, torso rigid, back arched, arms extended, head thrown back, and her body a dense crisscross network of gashes. The wounds were less than an inch apart, over skin and clothes alike, indiscriminately, leaving her in tatters. Her eyes were wide open and unblinking, fixed on an unseen spot on the ceiling. Stretched out like a puppet on strings unseen, _still_ she chanted on, without breaking for air.  
  
Merciful Zeus! Xander blinked several times, each time willing the image before him to dissolve into, well, not necessarily a basket of puppies, but even a nest of vampires could be considered an improvement at this point. It remained unchanged.  
  
The only part of Willow showing any sign of life was her moving lips, a rhythmic chant emerging from them that brought to mind the marching steps of an army of doom.  
  
“Willow!” Xander shook one of her extended arms. Willow gave no indication she felt or heard anything; and that scared the bejesus out of Xander.  
  
“She’s not answering!” Shrieked Anya, her eyes wide with mortal panic. She turned to Xander, full of fear and accusation. “Why isn’t she answering?”  
  
Words continued to pour out of Willow, and after a couple of repetitions Xander recognized the first line as the translated poem from Willow’s notebook:  
  
_The one I seek I do not fear_  
_A friend, a sister, we hold dear_  
_A soul transported against her will_  
_Untimely death to end blood spill_  
  
_The action wrong be mine to right_  
_Surrender her stolen life t’night_  
_Sacrifice unto sacrifice_  
_Flesh and blood to revive, to rise_  
  
_Rewind time’s current now_  
_Sacred revenge I avow_  
_Passage safe and sound I direct_  
_Return to us here, resurrect!_  
  
_Buffy Anne Summers_  
_Return to us!_  
_A soul to collect_  
_Body resurrect!_  
  
Xander waited for another iteration of the incantation to complete, just to see if Willow would come to her senses, or if her senses would be restored to her. No such luck. Up close, he took in her extensive injuries. Freakishly unstained by blood, her wounds exposed all too vividly the pink puckered slashes carved into her skin. A random image popped into Xander’s head, of how a layer of badly mixed paint would crack and curl and chip in the sun, exposing the naked wood underneath. He swallowed hard to battle rising bile at the thought of the same thing happening to his best friend.  
  
“Oh. My. God!” Anya was staring and hyperventilating, and for once, Xander thought that was the most natural, most human response given the situation. “The- the price!” She gasped, her voice high-pitched and tight, “Willow’s paying the price of the spell with her own blood!”  
  
And by God she was right. Willow was so pale she was almost glowing in the dark. How… How was she still performing the ritual? Where did she get the strength to keep going like that? He blinked rapidly, willing away the moisture that had no business accumulating in his manly eyes.  
  
Tara had begun to chant something low and lyrical, her eyes unreadable in the darkness and half shielded by strands of hair. In one hand extended over the candle closest to Willow, she held a tidy bunch of herbs secured with twine tied in a simple dead knot. It looked like...green onion? No, lemongrass, whose pungent, citrusy scent soon filled the small room. The other hand was clasping one of Willow’s.  
  
Tara set the lemongrass before Willow to rummage through a silk purse, and came up with a bright yellow crystal to lay on top of the herbs. At one point she paused her incantation to extend a hand to Anya and Xander. “Help me!”  
  
“How?” Xander asked, shaking Willow once more. _Zero response._  
  
“What do I do?” Anya crawled over. Her hands hovered over Willow, as if afraid that her touch would set Willow to crumble to pieces.  
  
“Hold her other hand. There. We need to channel more energy to her to give her a fighting chance.”  
  
There was no hesitation as the four of them formed a circle of linked hands once again, a united front against enemy unseen. Tara had resumed chanting, her voice hard and urgent, though she’d had to pause several times to collect herself. Tears and blood streamed down her face, for she, too, was covered in shallow cuts.  
  
It occurred to Xander that as the spellcaster, Willow must’ve borne the brunt of the assault. The rest of them were simply caught in the crossfire, so to speak. The crossfire of out-of-control homicidal lawn mowers, judging by their combined damage. But their injuries, however marked with gore, were superficial comparing to what Willow must’ve endured. Was _still_ enduring.  
  
After what felt like an eternity, with Willow as immobile as a statue and her hand growing colder in his grasp, Xander decided that enough was enough. He jumped to his feet. “No offense, Tara, but this isn’t working.”  
  
Tara continued to chant. Louder. Insistent. Damn it!  
  
“Anya!” he barked, then hearing the anger in his own voice, toned it down. “First aid kit. Please. Where do you keep your first aid kit?” He tried to raise Willow to her feet, but she was seemingly glued to the spot. He tried again, this time attempting to pick her up, fireman style, but Tara’s hand stayed his arm.  
  
“We can’t break the circle!” she shouted through her tears.  
  
“Screw the circle!” Xander shouted back. “She’s hurt badly, Tara. She’s white as a ghost! We lost Buffy, all right? Buffy’s gone. I’m not going to...” The rest of the sentence died in his throat. He would not give voice to his fear. It would be too real.  
  
Tara hesitated, while Anya said, “I’ll get the first aid kit, but I don’t think I have enough band-aids. Given how fragile humans are, we should—”  
  
Xander never got to hear what Anya thought they should do, because the instant she tried to leave the sand circle, she was thrown back by an invisible force. Willow’s head snapped in Anya’s direction, and sunlight, golden and piercing and unforgiving, streamed from her wide eyes.  
  
Temporarily blinded, Xander stumbled.  
  
“Mortal children who dared summon a god!” boomed an unfamiliar voice from Willow’s lips, dripping with contempt. Her pose relaxed, and she emitted a low rumbling laugh that shook the ground. And damned if that wasn’t a scary sound!  
  
Willow’s lips curled up into a cruel imitation of a smile. Not-her-voice continued, pausing between each word, “So insignificant. Asking so much, with so little to give in return. Shall I grant your request and name my price?”  
  
With robotic movements, as if operating her arm for the first time, Not-Willow drew a ceremonial dagger from Willow’s pocket. It was the same dagger they’d used earlier to extract their own blood for the ritual. The blade glistened, cool and bright and sharp and lethal.  
  
Oh, crap.  
  
Everyone sprung into action at once. Xander threw himself onto Willow’s arm and tried to wrestle the dagger away. It was like trying to pry open fingers made of stone. Anya tried to snuff the ritual candles, but the yelps of pain that erupted from her were anything but encouraging. Tara smashed the mirror along with the blood bowl with a shout. Her words came out in a rush:  
  
_Thy invitation rescinded,_  
_Thy spirit be expelled._  
_From out of the Underworld thou rose,_  
_And unto the Underworld shalt thou return._  
  
But the amused laughter from Willow roared louder. “Am I to be disposed of so soon? Oh, but this one tastes of _power_...juuust enough to be interesting. Shall I stay to—”  
  
“You shall not! Nobody hurts my Willow!” Tara screamed, her eyes burning with intent. Not in the sense that one’s eyes might burn with passion. They actually burned, glowing red in the darkness. In fact, her entire torso was engulfed in a red glow of energy. She sprinkled more herbs over possessed Willow and commanded:  
  
_From out of the Underworld thou rose,_  
_And unto the Underworld shalt thou return!_  
_Heed my word. Be gone, Atum, be gone!_  
  
The laughter turned into a hiss, and Xander was barely able to make out the god’s last words: “Suffered I your empty words. Reap what you sow in time! That shall be your punishment enough.”  
  
Then everything went slack and the world turned blank.

  
_~ To be continued... ~_


	11. To Do Me Due Delight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Buffy is resurrected!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is taken from the 16th century song "Come Again, Sweet Love Doth Now Invite" by John Dowland:
> 
> _Come again! sweet love doth now invite_   
>  _Thy graces that refrain_   
>  _To do me due delight,_   
>  _To see, to hear, to touch, to kiss, to die,_   
>  _With thee again in sweetest sympathy._
> 
> _Come again! that I may cease to mourn_   
>  _Through thy unkind disdain;_   
>  _For now left and forlorn_   
>  _I sit, I sigh, I weep, I faint, I die_   
>  _In deadly pain and endless misery._

Spike cranked up the radio with a generous twist of the volume dial and filled the night air with the unreserved howls of the Ramones. Fucking station had the nerve to call itself the "Oldies," as if classics like the Ramones would ever age. He liked the song, too, an underrated latter day number called, ironically in hindsight, _Too Tough to Die_. It took only a moment for him to recall the lyrics, and he roared along with not a shred of self-consciousness, the demon in him too cool for wasted emotions as social anxieties.

 _Main attraction in a freak side show_  
_Down in the basement where the cobwebs grow_  
_On my last leg just gettin' by_  
_Halo round my head too tough to die_  
  
For all his audacity, Spike was disappointed that there was not a soul around to witness his karaoke mastery. Bloody shame. Fact was, the closer he got to Sunnydale, the deader it got on the two-lane road. Sunnydalitis notwithstanding, people consciously or unconsciously avoided unnecessary trips out of the safety of their homes at night.  
  
_I am a tu tu tu tu tu tu tu tu tough tough guy_  
_Halo round my head too tough to die_  
  
Too soon, the song proved not too tough to die after all, and it segued into a commercial. He switched off the radio, the better for continuing his solo of the chorus, fingers drumming on the steering wheel on beat.  
  
Some other rhythmic tapping tripped his vampire hearing, not quite “tu tu tu tu,” more of a scritch scratch thumpity thump, but no less energetic. He went on instant alert, engaging all of his predatory senses and pulling the car to a gradual stop where he thought the sound came loudest through the trees. The repetition sped up, seemingly growing desperate by the second.  
  
Spike looked about him. It was the outskirts of Sunnydale, no real landmarks to speak of. Just a roadside cultivated wood that no doubt led to a cemetery, the first of so many that spread through the town like a game of divide and conquer with the undead challenging the living. Whoever was out here at this hour was either up to no good, or about to be turned into dead meat. He might’ve let it go, except he’d been bored out of his mind by the hours of pointless driving that achieved sodding nothing besides sending him on a premature return-to-sender loop like a problem package.  
  
Right. He got out of the car with vampire stealth and approached the source of the sound. Friend or foe, he wanted in on the action. Bust a demon and rescue a damsel, break the conjuring circle of a dark witch or warlock, or forcibly end an ill-conceived teenage dare. Anyway, he’d get to stretch his legs and hopefully swing his fist a few times, easy peasy. After the fun, he’d take care of the unpleasant but necessary business of paying Anya a visit to make her ‘fess up about this fool’s errand.  
  
An overwhelming sense of dread and confusion stopped him dead in his tracks when he got to the edge of the cemetery. His vampire senses were going haywire. Demon, vamp, human, god...nothing fit, nothing felt right, yet every cell in his reanimated body was screaming for attention.  
  
He listened, half expecting to hear his own heartbeat for the violent wave of energy he felt pulsing through his body. The rhythm of the strange sound felt so close he could almost feel its impact under his feet. It’d slowed to long strokes punctured with sharp hits, like wood being struck with varying objects and strengths. A ritual of some kind, perhaps? He sniffed hard, and was greeted with the acrid scent of power in the air. Dark magic.  
  
Welcome back to Sunnydale, indeed.  
  
If he was smart, he’d hightail out of there, but, well, curiosity killed more than the cat. And he’d been many things, but never a coward, even when he hadn’t been much. So he resumed his cautious approach, bracing for an incoming attack while preparing to launch an ambush of his own.  
  
A tombstone gleamed in the moonlight, coming into sight so suddenly it might as well have been dropped from the sky, and so close he stumbled a step back to make out the inscription. It bore words long since etched in his heart but somehow refused to form before his eyes just now, until with effort he sounded them out: “Bu-ffy Summers. Beloved sister, devoted friend. Sh-she saved the world. A lot.”  
  
The remains of a bouquet of roses he’d left there a couple of weeks ago laid on disturbed soil, and he forced down blinding rage. He circled the tomb to better inspect the damage. What kind of a poxy pillock of a demon dared defile the tomb of the—  
  
Tortured cries, feeble like the choked back sobs of a trapped animal, raspy like the crunch of dried leaves, added to the tapping, scratching, rattling, and kicking noises. They came from below, straight down the mushrooming soil under his feet, echoing in his ear. There was something familiar in the bone-dry voice—a woman’s, he realized in time—and recognition descended like a mental fog, a tick after the horror dawned. It was impossible, and yet—  
  
Buffy?  
  


* * *

  
It was the most peculiar and disturbing sensation, novel and violent like death. Only instead of the comfort of dissolving into a surcease of struggle, it progressed in intensity and simply went on, despite her protest. She had the feeling of being simultaneously summoned and dispersed, extracted and consumed, condensed and stretched, blasted into countless fragments to be distilled into a purer concentration, then poured into a new form, to fill a void that didn’t used to exist. The perverse separation of self from self. The crystallization of a pristine identity from the retelling of an old tale. What was leaving, and what would remain?  
  
Then she was dropped into a prison, or a prison was forged around her, and she found herself (for that was all she had, what she was, right, herself?) struggling for comprehension, straining for freedom. The sense of loss was immense in her chest, and she became aware of her physical form that embodied all of its limitations and none of its power. It bound instead of enabled. It took from her instead of gave.  
  
An urgency, something new—or maybe it’d always been there, she wasn’t sure of anything anymore—compelled her to inflate her lungs. The air that she anticipated rushing forward to greet her never materialized. Instead, she became aware of the vacuum around her, attempting to engulf her, breathe her in. Stars flashed behind her eyes (how strange—shouldn’t stars be in...Heaven?) while reality pressed in closer, with dirt and mold and damp full of the smell of death and decay and dread—  
  
Screams died in her throat before she could mould them into sounds, shape them into words, transform intent into action. She lashed out at the confines of her prison, hands and knees and shoulders and feet, willing atrophied muscles into awkward efforts of self-preservation.  
  
She came away with decomposing wood under her nails and fabrics dissolving in her grasps like spider silk. But the walls of the prison held, ironclad for all of her desperate attempt, despite the passage of time (and all the worms) that had been eating away at its defenses. Did she manage to call for help? Was there a response to her call at all? Certainty was such a luxury when she doubted her own existence, questioned her own identity.  
  
Just before she succumbed to the fog of confusion that had settled over everything like a bell jar of frosted glass, a thought or a memory, a dream or a prophecy, flashed behind her eyes and brought with it a measure of peace:  
  
_Death is your gift._  
  


* * *

  
Reason abandoned him. Coherence was beyond reach. No space for thought or hesitation, only instinct. With a roar that split the night air, animalistic and raw, Spike threw himself onto the soil that trapped his Slayer, unable to bear the separation a second longer. With ferocious force and a demon’s tenacity, he attacked her grave with his bare hands. Fingernails, no match for the dry soil, first peeled back from the trauma then broke away; rocks and other uninvestigated sharp objects tore at his hands and arms. But he remained undeterred, his motion a rush of blur even for his vamp vision. If there was any chance, any at all…  
  
Dirt was everywhere: in his clothes, his hair, his eyelashes, his flared nostrils, his opened mouth, even between his gritted teeth. At some point he tasted blood, and had to force himself to unclench—he’d been biting the inside of his cheek to prevent himself from crying out loud.  
  
He didn’t think a sobbing mess of a rescuer would help calm what must be a scared and confused Buffy.  
  
He spat out a mouthful of dirt to make himself audible, and managed to slur out, “Hang on!” He’d regained enough of his senses to remember to say something reassuring. “Hang on, love, Gonna get you out!”  
  
No response reassured him in return.  
  
His vision became obstructed, blurred, then resolidified, cleared by tears he didn’t realize were streaming down his face. Memories of the shock of awakening to discover his own entombment and fighting his way out of the coffin as a newly risen fledgling overlaid his vision. They brought back a wave of nausea and dizzying flashes of subsequent nightmares of being buried alive that’d taken him decades to shake off.  
  
“Fuck!” Frustration mingled with fear, and panic swept through him like he was dust in an arctic wind. Fear that he’d fail this rescue attempt too, that giving his all wouldn’t be enough, that just when he’d made peace with Buffy’s death, he’d found more to lose. Even with vamp strength, digging a grave with one’s bare hands was apparently slow work. Time was not on his side. How the Hell did she end up coming back to life in her own sodding grave?  
  
He kicked the ground in a blinding fury, and it dipped with a muffled crack. Inspired, he rained a series of kicks that’d intimidate the best of martial arts masters on the same squishy spot, until one foot met a sharp resistance that shattered a second later, and his leg sank down to his knee. Breakthrough.  
  
“Buffy!” he managed to choke out. Retracting his leg, Spike dropped down flat on the coffin lid to peer through the hole made by the substantial heel of his Doc Martens, then stuck one hand in. It unclenched and flexed with unnatural stiffness, something he didn’t have time to investigate then.  
  
He reached into the coffin and felt around for...what? Oh, God, was he expecting the touch of the fabrics of her clothes? Human flesh? Of course she’d be human, wouldn’t she? Otherwise what exactly had been stirring in her coffin? He realized that he’d been dodging rightful questions, delaying their answers. Because if any of it was Buffy, then he wouldn’t— He _couldn’t_ — Nobody _should_ expect him to—  
  
“Slayer!” He clamped down on his mutinous thoughts. Not bloody now. Not nearly helpful. “Buffy!” he tried again. Silence was his only response, which only twisted another round on the knot in his stomach. Now that he had a jagged edge to apply leverage, he made short work of the remaining lid, smashing most of it and sending pieces of wood airborne. One of his fists emerged looking like a pincushion, with sharp fragments of wood sticking out in every which way. He shook it like dismissing a nuisance; it was a small price to pay for the rescue of his unlife. For Buffy, he’d move the sun and the moon, let alone a mound of earth.  
  
When, on his hands and knees, he finally managed to get an unconscious but definitely alive Buffy out (her heartbeat irregular but detectable), he couldn’t break his reverent silence. There she was, small and frail and barely alive and deathly still, a former ray of vibrant sunshine reduced to a ghostly shadow in the moonlight. Yet somehow, she still appeared to shine a dazzling brilliance. And he knew without a sliver of doubt, by the way his unbeating heart twisted and seemed to lurch in his throat, that he loved her—loved her before, and would go on loving her still—with every fiber of his being, demon and human.  
  
He wanted to commit the night to memory. Demon recollection was both a blessing and a curse: no dying brain cells meant no deteriorating memories. Long after she was gone—after a ripe, long third lease on life, of course—he’d still be carrying this moment in his heart. It wouldn’t be nearly enough as having the real, living, breathing Buffy by his side, but it would be the next best thing. And one day, it would have to do.  
  
But not now. _Now_ … Overcome with emotion, he sputtered, but words remained impossible. He mouthed her name and shook her gently. Her heartbeat was uncomfortably low, but for something whose existence was a miracle to begin with, Spike thought it was the most hypnotizing music, set to the rhythm of the universe. When he realized he’d been holding his breath, he took quick, greedy gulps to fill his lungs in an imitation of life, letting the cold night air wash over and infuse him.  
  
The pungent scent of fresh human blood assaulted his senses. He vamped out, unable to reign in the demon whose fury had powered him through the excavation with a boost in strength. A quick full-body inspection of his sleeping beauty revealed only superficial injuries: battered knuckles and fingers, bruise on the head, some cuts and scrapes here and there—injuries consistent with trying to bust out of one’s own coffin. He should know. Introspective thoughts over his loss of control were edged out by an overwhelming elation: human blood meant human body, and that meant—Buffy was back! She wasn’t a zombie or a vampire or a demon. She was human, and she was alive!  
  
Beaming at her with unadulterated joy, he smoothed the tangled waves of her hair, brushed loose dirt off her shoulders, cupped her bloodied, broken hands with his, and drank her in with his hungry eyes all the way down to her toes (he’d lost her shoes in the scuffle).  
  
“Oh, Buffy!” he murmured her name, the highest exaltation of his heart. His fingers felt magnetized to her; he needed to touch her, craving with desperation the physical confirmation of a vision made corporeal, a dream come true.  
  
For all his adoration, he was slow to notice the unusual cool in her skin, the disturbing quiet of her chest, her ashen complexion, her blue lips.  
  
Already, like the elusive dream that she embodied, lying inert, unconscious next to her open grave, so soon after her violent return to this world, Buffy was slipping away.  
  


* * *

  
Tara came to with a shiver down her spine. The world was sideways, and dark. Not the kind of happy, fallen-asleep-in-her-mother’s-arms sideways darkness, but the kind that was disoriented and cold, with a chill that was soul-deep. She sat up and absentmindedly brushed off sand that’d been stuck to her temple, looking all around—  
  
And her eyes widened at the sight of the unconscious forms of Willow, Xander and Anya, also on the floor of what she just realized was the back room at the Magic Box. She rushed to her friends and shook them, one by one, calling. None of them stirred.  
  
Her mind racing, she tried to figure out how the four of them had come to be passed out at the Magic Box, with the lights off, but couldn’t begin to unravel her memories. They felt…tampered with, and trying to recall what happened was like trying to find a door while blindfolded. She knew it was there somewhere, but it continued to elude her. She had the frustrated suspicion that it stayed just out of touch, taunting her, snickering at her clumsiness.  
  
She tried to rouse Willow again, and her fingers came away slick and sticky. Raising her hands right up to her face, she almost screamed when she realized that it had to be blood. A quick investigation of the source of the crunches beneath her shuffling feet uncovered shards of broken glass—the old-fashioned, non-safety kind. Had Willow cut herself in an accident? Too dizzy to stand, Tara scrambled on all fours into the hallway to reach the phone, struggling with leaden legs that dragged. She leaned on the wall to pull herself up in order to reach the wall-mounted receiver, wobbling unsteadily all the while. It took an inordinate amount of effort, but she managed to dial 9-1-1 on the keypad before she felt her legs give out from under her.  
  
Clutching the phone to her chest like her last hope, Tara watched helplessly as the rest of the world dissolved around her.  
  


* * *

  
In time, _she_ grew aware of another invasion, the insistent nudging of life. Of the ebb and flow of breath, blowing away the previous heaviness in her chest. She had the distinct sensation of rising. Not the merciful transcendence of cease-to-be, more like the helplessness of a puppet being pulled by her strings. Like a Buffy puppet. Puppet Buffy. _Buffy_. That was her name, wasn’t it? Who she used to be.  
  
She was too tired, too weak to be anything other than compliant, anything more than perfectly malleable. So she ceded control to the universe, and imagined herself as the everlasting pulse of the waves, a side effect of the moon’s orbit around the sun, a part of nature. With no designs of her own, no worries to—  
  
A sound penetrated the roar of the ocean’s back-and-forth cycles, a voice, and she listened without interest. Clinging to the comfort in her passivity, she observed the mysteries of the universe without curiosity.  
  
“Breathe, dammit! One one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand, four one-thousand, five bloody-thousand.”  
  
She felt the tides rush in again, and waited for them to recede. Back and forth, a calming pattern.  
  
But the voice took on a familiar shadow behind her eyes. A tingling of recognition gnawed at her consciousness. It awakened a mix of emotions battling for dominance. Strong ones, like fear, and a sense of safety, hate, and...not hate. The waves fell back, leaving behind fragments of memories, like shells glistening on the beach.  
  
“Breathe, Slayer! You’re stronger than this! You’re the strongest bloody fighter I’ve ever met. Five one-thousand!”  
  
This time when the tides came in they carried with them the awareness of cold lips pressing into her own, sealing around them, of oxygen being breathed into her mouth, of her cheeks inflating, of her nose being pinched closed, of the same oxygen flowing into her lungs, of her chest rising in response. Then the lips around hers were gone, and a sigh escaped from her parted lips.  
  
“Come on, Buffy! You’re not going to fucking die on me. Not again! If a vampire can breathe against the laws of Nature, so can you!”  
  
The mystery shattered, and dumbfounded by the discovery, she gasped, and took in a shaky inhale.  
  
“There’s a good Slayer! Breathe! Buffy, can you hear me? Buffy?”  
  
The waves receded for the last time, and reality rushed in. She felt a hand shake her by the shoulders, felt fingertips ghost the contour of her face. She felt the wind whip through her hair, ticklish around her chin. She felt the cold earth against her back and a hand snaking beneath her neck to cradle her body into a gentle recline. She felt sharp pain shooting down her body, all the way to her toes. She missed being the tides. But if she wasn’t a derivative of a physics equation, then she was…  
  
Her eyes shot open. Inches away from her face, a pair of amber eyes resolved from twin blurs of light. They watched her with burning intensity from a demented face with a bumpy forehead and fangs that protruded from quivering lips, stretching them into a menacing smile. The face glistened with muddy tear tracks, a confusing picture of sharp angles and soft expression in the pale moonlight. The vampire choked back a cry, shaking loose some of the dirt covering his mop of shocking platinum curls in the process. He raised a mangled and bloodied hand to her face, then withdrew it after her eyes widened at the sight of it.  
  
“Oh, thank God!” he said, trying to conceal his sniffles. His voice was thick through his fangs, thicker with emotion. And all too loud in the quiet night. “Gave me a right fright, you did! Thought my heart was going to burst!”  
  
She was immobilized on the spot. He swallowed, letting out a shaky laugh. “You’ve dusted how many vampires now? Stake, fire, beheading, crossbow...bet you’ve never scared one to dust!”  
  
Vampires. Demons. _Monsters_. She was back in this hopeless world. Back to this endless, thankless, inescapable, ultimate short-end of a destiny. Not even death had shielded her, had saved her.  
  
She took a deep breath, the chilly night air burning all the way down, like needles. She was still getting used to having to breathe repeatedly, regularly, not just for now or for a little while, but for the rest of her life. _Then the one after that._  
  
So she did the only thing that made sense. She summoned all of her strength, and screamed.  
  
~ To be continued... ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can listen to "Too Tough to Die" by the Ramones on YouTube at:  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRAha8VLs4E
> 
> Lyrics:  
> http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/ramones/tootoughtodie.html


	12. The Figure of Our Being Less Than Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So the spell was cast, Buffy was resurrected, and by luck or destiny, Spike happened to be where he was most needed. Now what?
> 
> Scenes from the first night of Buffy’s resurrection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is taken from the poem, "Meeting and Passing", by Robert Frost. An excerpt:
> 
> ... We met. But all  
> We did that day was mingle great and small  
> Footprints in summer dust as if we drew  
> The figure of our being less than two  
> But more than one as yet.  
> Beta'd by the talented and wondrous All4Spike.

The ending credits of _Never Been Kissed_ were scrolling languidly on TV as Janice blew her nose loudly into a tissue. “I, like, _totally_ didn’t think he was gonna show!”

Dawn rolled her eyes with the jaded impatience of a grownup who’d _been there, done that_. “Hello! Romantic comedy. Have you ever watched a Drew Barrymore film that ended badly?” She tossed the empty DVD case to the wet mess of a BFF next to her and stretched with languid movements. “‘Course he was going to show at the last possible second and give her this amaaazing kiss. The title alone should carry a spoiler alert.”

Janice honked into another tissue, indignant at Dawn’s dismissal. “Like _you_ ’d know! Like _you_ ’ve ever been kissed!”

Dawn scoffed, “You don’t have to live a cliché to recognize one. That movie was tropes galore.” If her life were a TV show, well, then the writers should’ve won an award or something. How many teenagers could claim to have originated from an ancient ball of energy, with transdimensional travel as a property of their blood? _That_ was original. _That_ was cool.

Janice opened her mouth to argue, but her comeback was preempted by the abrupt arrival of Janice’s mom.

“Sorry to interrupt your girls’ night…” said Mrs. Penshaw in a sympathetic mom voice, then tucked a telephone handset, still warm from use, into Dawn’s hand. “Change of plans. Dawn, phone call for you.”

This could not be a good sign. Pressing the phone to her ear, Dawn managed a timid, “Hello?”

“Niblet! First, don’t panic. You’re coming home. Be a good girl and pack up —”

“Spike?”

Dawn threw a furtive glance at Mrs. Penshaw, who was whispering to a wide-eyed Janice, neither of them smiling. A barrage of sirens roared in the distance and Dawn rushed to the window and craned her neck to scan the sky in the direction of her house. The house itself wouldn’t have been visible, but it was still reassuring to see no fire or other obvious signs of calamity. “Why? What happened? What’s wrong?”

“Everything’s fine. Look, I might’ve told the Penshaws that big sis has been in an accident to get you out of this sleepover, so act the part. I’m supposed to be ringing from the hospital.”

“Ohmigod!” She cupped the receiver and dropped her voice to a bare whisper, “Did Willow blow something up again? She okay?”

“Ye— Dawn, get home safely. I’ll explain. _After_.”

“Sure,” She sighed. “Can’t trust you guys with the house for _one_ night. Sometimes I feel like _I’m_ the adult here.”

Dawn handed over the phone, only to be pulled into a protective hug by Mrs. Penshaw, who choked into her ear, “I’m so sorry about Buffy.”

Something rose in her throat at the unexpected sincerity of her remark. Dawn swallowed, hard.

“Party pooper,” said Janice, turning off the local news about some five-alarm fire in the warehouse district. “I hope your sister’s okay. Falls can get pretty bad. She’s lucky it’s not more serious.”

The words sent a shiver down Dawn’s spine. She zipped up her jacket. “Yeah, lucky.”

It was only when she was in the passenger seat on her way home, replaying that weird phone call in her head, that she remembered Spike calling her, “Dawn.”

He never called her by name.

Unless it was really, _really_ serious.

* * *

Nurse Rosa examined the last of the four patients just brought into ER at the Sunnydale Memorial Hospital with practiced efficiency meant to save lives. White male, twenty years old, lifelong Sunnydale resident, name of Alexander Harris, with nothing significant in his medical history, although the computer did reveal a previous hospital visit for a broken arm.

Similar to two of the three other women brought in with him, he displayed extensive surface lacerations all over his body. They were not animalistic in nature, and did not appear self-inflicted. She’d checked for neck injuries and puncture wounds first, based on experience and simple statistics, and to her relief, found none. Judging by the scabs, no significant blood loss had occurred.

In fact, she’d be tempted to dismiss him with nothing more than a tube of Neosporin, a booster shot for tetanus, a referral to Psych and a stern lecture not to juggle knives or whatever the hell he’d been doing to lead to this, if it weren’t for the troubling fact that he was inexplicably unconscious. As were the other two women in similar condition. The prioritized patient, a young woman named Rosenberg, had arrived in critical condition and needed a blood transfusion right away. She, too, was unconscious, but at least in her case it was medically justifiable.

Not that, after twenty years on the job, Rosa demanded medical justification or even logical ones of her patients. The wacky, freaky, bizarro cases she’d seen at Sunnydale Memorial could fill a whole book series. Her paranormal memoir collection would put the X-Files to shame. And then they’d lock her up in the loony bin and throw away the key. No, thanks. Not when she had a family to support, including a college-bound son.

“Hey, Enru!” she intercepted an EMT heading for the exit. The twenty-something Asian man did a smooth one-eighty-degree turn without looking up from his gameboy.

“What up, Rosalita?”

“The unconscious four. Where did you pick them up?”

Enru shoved both of his hands into his pockets and whistled. “Maple Court. Store that called itself the Magic Box, of all things. Central dispatched us, a 9-1-1 response, mystery tipster. We got there just before SunnyD’s best.” He dropped his voice conspiratorially and added, “It was kind of spooky. Lights out, funky sand circle, bunch of melted candles, fire marks on the carpet. Had to access the front area of the store to get to them, and there was everything from herbs in apothecary jars to colored crystals to wacky alien statues on display. Strictly off the record, but betcha anything it’s some kind of experimental drug.” He thought some more, then added, “Maybe even a cult.”

“Drugs, huh?” The presence of drugs she could test for. She scribbled a reminder to order labworks for the four patients. Enru’s pocket buzzed before she could drill him for a more detailed description of the “spooky” scene, and he was already dashing for the door. “Gotta go!” he called back, clicking a pager silent. “Fire in progress. Priority Delta. Don’t say I didn’t warn ya—this could be a hot one!”

Priority Delta, Rosa remembered without hesitation, was one of the highest priority codes. It mapped to imminent danger with unknown impact. And a fire… She rubbed her temples, then smoothed back a lock of brown hair that had escaped from the tight bun at her nape. Look sharp. Instead of heading back to her workstation, she made a beeline for the kitchenette for a caffeine refill. Emergency contacts for Rosenberg and Harris were local, and presumably already en route to the hospital after being alerted. And she had very few answers in hand for them. Her triage queue was empty, thankfully, but a fire could turn that into a long night in the blink of an arriving ambulance vehicle.

* * *

Dispelling a million theories about Spike’s cryptic phone call, Dawn burst into the front door and was immediately encased into a hug by her sister.

“There you are!” said Buffy brightly. “I was beginning to worry!”

“Hiya, Buffy!” Dawn closed her eyes, lingering in the surprising comfort of the cold but well-calibered embrace of the Bot. “Shouldn’t you be doing your overnight recharging? C’mon, I’ll plug you in.” With a tilt of her chin, she indicated the staircase.

“Oh, no. Spike sent me downstairs with the ‘greeter’ routine.”

“Well, mission accomplished. You, greeter. Me, greetee.” Dawn glanced in the direction of Willow and Tara’s bedroom. The lights were off. Weird. But if the Bot is reluctant to go upstairs… “Tell me, how much trouble is Willow in?”

The Bot knitted her brows, apparently processing it extra hard. “Is Willow in trouble? Can I help?”

Huh. So she didn’t know, either. Secretive vampire was being really secretive. “Never mind. I’d better check in with Spike.”

Dawn started for the basement, but the Bot pulled her back. “Spike? He’s upstairs with Buffy, I mean the other me. I told Spike I was willing to share my bed, but he got mad and—”

* * *

She must’ve raced up the entire flight of stairs (vaguely registering muddy footprints on the polished floorboards), because there she was, charging toward Buffy’s old bedroom faster than her thoughts could follow, with her heart in her throat and her body as tense as a bow-string. She didn’t realize she was shaking until the door knob, cold and slippery, rattled in her grip. Then the door was swinging open in an over-dramatic slow-motion reveal and she—

—plowed head first into a wall that was Spike’s chest.

“Oomph!” Spike caught her, halting her momentum. A voice shrill and so unlike her own, demanded, “Where is she?”

“ _Dawn_.”

Who did he think he was, all calm and solemn, an expression made extra ridiculous by his tousled hair, rumpled t-shirt, soggy jeans, and bare feet, guarding Buffy’s room like some self-appointed gatekeeper. Shrouded in darkness, Buffy’s room looked unoccupied, the hallway overhead light that spilled in only serving to paint the shadows darker. But the Bot clearly said… He _couldn’t_ have…

The voice her sister had always compared to a boombox? She unleashed it then. “So help me God! Where. Is. My. Sister!”

“Easy, Bit.” Spike had the sense to step aside, but kept a firm grip on her shoulder. “She’s safe now. But in shock. Confusion. It comes and goes.” He turned to the bed and she followed his gaze, squinting while her eyes adjusted to the darkness.

Buffy sat unmoving against the headboard, with her fluffy comforter arranged neatly around her, like a doll that’d been staged in imitation of life. Mr. Gordo was posed by her side, leaning into her, unwanted, as though a piece of prop for a photo op.

The scene didn’t look real. It looked…like a shrine featuring a look-alike mannequin. It was beyond creepy.

“How—” Dawn pressed her lips shut on the rest of the sentence. She didn’t want an explanation; it was the confirmation that she needed.

“Found her struggling to bust out of her own grave,” came Spike’s voice from beside her, low and dreamy and irreconcilable with the violence of the tale. “Figured I’d finally gone round the bend.” He laughed, just once, softly, as if amused by the idea of himself going mad. “One _hell_ of a trick, even for old Sunnydale.”

But this was not a rabbit pulled out of a hat. It was Buffy. Alive. Even if, with her expression neutral and her eyes unfocused, she looked more like the Bot reset to its factory default, devoid of human emotions. Absent of Buffy’s usual liveliness, her sister’s face looked gaunt rather than slender, her frame so tiny she looked buried in the bedding. Oh, God. Not _buried_. What a terrible choice of words.

Tentatively, she took a step forward. “Buffy?”

No answer.

“Is- Is she…?” She turned to Spike, begging him to understand the question in her eyes. After the almost-been with her Mom, she didn’t want her heart broken again.

Spike nodded. “Yeah. She’s weak as a kitten someone’d tried to bury alive. If I find out who…” He broke off suddenly, eyes flashing amber for a split second, before he turned his head away and was enveloped in shadows. In the dead quiet of the room she could hear his shaky breaths.

She didn’t want to follow the obvious train of thought his half-swallowed words betrayed, not in indignation over implied violence, but because—she realized with more than a little disgust—that she’d be right behind him. This was no act of kindness, but a form of violation. She wanted to make whoever was responsible understand. Spike would probably go one step further, and make them _real sorry_.

Finally Spike’s breathing evened out and he continued, “Reckon she has to be traumatized, after finding herself encased in a coffin six feet under, then barely surviving that. Meeting the Bot…didn’t exactly help. Uh, she’s not quite up to trading quips just yet, or saying much anything at all. But she understands well enough. She’s not… _not_ …” He seemed to struggle for words for a moment, then restarted, “She’s…” Another pause. “She’s Buffy.”

Relief washed over Dawn. If anyone could tell for sure, it’d be Spike. What with the gross vampire hyper sense of smell and the top-of-the-foodchain predator’s instinct. Not to mention his twisted history with her sister.

Spike nudged her forward. “Go on, then. What’re you waiting for, Niblet?”

What was she waiting for? How about some kind of sign that, finally, just this once, everything was going to be all right? Green balls of energy needed fairytales, too. If the weave of her narrative had to span demons and superheroes, magic and prophecies, why couldn’t it loop in a benevolent fairy godmother who granted her every wish or a flying boy with a detachable shadow who took her to fantastical new lands? True, she hadn’t fallen into a long, bewitched sleep at the drop of her blood, but the hell god Glory had only failed to bleed her dry because her sister had voluntarily died in her place. And Buffy’s life— _lives_ —would forever be cursed by her duty, the Slayer equivalent of the restless red shoes that would eventually dance her (always, inevitably) to her grave.

And what in all of the dimensions had the monks been _thinking_ implanting in her all this useless fairytale nonsense, when they’d known her life could only ever be tragic?

“Buffy?” She saw her outstretched arm reaching for her sister, a physical extension of her longing, though the forward motion of her legs only vaguely registered in her consciousness. Buffy looked so empty, so broken, propped up between the rigidity of the wall and the tenderness of the comforter, engulfed in shadows, that Dawn wasn’t sure her sister was really there.

She ducked her head to try to catch Buffy’s eye. “Look at me, Buffy. It’s Dawn, your sister.” She hated how her voice cracked and broke on the second syllable of the word “sister”, suddenly fearful that she was unworthy of the intimacy it signified. She’d been supernatural sans superpowers, a human life without a human origin, a burden and a storm, a death sentence and the weakest link. She’d been a sister in contrivance only, imposed upon the Slayer and her family and able to walk in and out of the sanctity of Buffy’s house as she pleased without an invitation only because of her fabricated humanity. She belonged here least of all; unfit, really, to plead, to demand anything of Buffy, now that Buffy was back from the death she had set in motion and sealed with her purloined blood.

Her legs buckled and she sank down too hard on the bed, yet Buffy gave no acknowledgement whatsoever.

“Keep talking, Bit. She’s in there somewhere.”

When a soulless vampire was the one dishing out sensible advice? Not a good sign. But she had to try. “I missed you, Buffy. I- I remember what you said. ‘The hardest thing in this world... is to live in it.’” Her voice cracked, but she pushed on. “Buffy, I’ve been brave. I’ve faced my greatest fear and conquered it: I made up all my classes in summer school. See? Even a hell god couldn’t make me a dropout. Aren’t you proud of me?” She forced a smile that could not survive the tears that followed. 

“Buffy you have to be strong. Now that you’re back…” Dawn stubbornly wiped away tears that streamed down her face, fighting back their attempt to derail her speech about courage. She charged forward through hiccups to utter her plea, “You have to be brave. And live. For me.”

The tears won—as if there’d ever been any doubt. She was sobbing in earnest now, the world all a shivery blur, awash in tears that’d never dried over the stifled summer without Buffy, for an endless grief she was still navigating, even now, after the death in question had been...averted? No, reversed. Fists full of Buffy’s comforter growing damp in her grasp, she allowed her body to go slack over the bed. She felt all the suppressed anger and fear and sorrow and confusion the depth of which she’d concealed even from herself, spill out of her, as if from a pressurized bottle abruptly uncorked. It was both terrifying and liberating. And she wanted to stop, but the emotional waves she was riding carried a life of its own, and—

She sensed it more than felt it, a feathery caress running the length of her hair, warm and gentle and more familiar than she had any right to lay claim to in this world, and she jerked her head up and found herself held in Buffy’s maternal gaze, the alarm in her green eyes melting to a warm glow.

“Dawn,” she heard Buffy say, without inflection, as if to test the way the word rolled off her tongue, to affirm to herself the reality of Dawn’s presence.

Dawn nodded encouragingly. “Buffy? I’m here.”

“Dawn,” Buffy said again, her voice tinged with a sense of recognition, as if finally having reconciled sight with memory. Her hands, thin and deathly pale in the moonlight (and covered in bandages—why were they covered in bandages?), pulled Dawn into a tight embrace as Dawn poured bonelessly into her arms. Clutching to Buffy in a death grip, she was taken aback by how small and insignificant her older sister felt.

Then a third time: “Dawn!” Confident and natural and affectionate, and Dawn felt her heart burst at Buffy’s call.

“You’re back!” she wept into Buffy’s shirt and wound her arms even tighter around Buffy. “You’re back! Oh, I’ve missed you so much, Buffy. I love you!”

“Oh, Dawnie!” Buffy gasped, untangling the wet mess that was Dawn from her torso and taking both of Dawn’s hands into her own. “I love you more than anything in the world.”

At that, Dawn couldn’t help but beam up at Buffy with a smile stretched from ear to ear, lingering hiccups notwithstanding. As she pulled Buffy into another hug (because now that she had Buffy back, she was determined to never let go, literally, at least for another hour), she absentmindedly noted the fresh scent of shampoo in Buffy’s hair and inhaled deep. More than anything, it made her feel safe, feel secure, feel at home.

Basking in the joy of Buffy’s return, she banished traitorous thoughts about the how and the why. If she could send them to perish in another dimension to be never brought up again, it would only be too soon.

Buffy was back, and that was all that mattered. She was not going to examine the fact like a curio put under a magnifying class. Knowledge (no matter what Giles would say, glancing up from his stuffy books) gave no comfort, unlike a sister’s affectionate arms. She was going to take it as the gift it was, no questions asked, and take it for granted, without guilt or shame.

Buffy was back, and everything else she could forgive, forget, pretend never happened in the first place, and wilfully ignore, extending to the barrage of fire sirens howling in the distance trying (in vain) to shatter the sanctuary they’d found in each other’s arms.

(To be continued...)


	13. What Daylight Never Showed To Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is a variation of a line from the poem “Dreams” by Anne Brontë. To quote the relevant part of the poem may give away the sentiment too much, but if you’re interested, you may read the poem in its entirety at:
> 
> http://www.poemhunter.com/poems/dream/page-1/16690/
> 
> Beta’d by the stupendous All4Spike. Special guest red pencil by the fabulous and illuminous AnnaH and Bewildered. You have my undying gratitude. All remaining errors are the result of my last-minute tinkering.
> 
> Chapter rating: NC-17.

**Chapter 13. What Daylight Never Showed To Me**

Spike forced himself to let go of the doorknob to Buffy’s room before he tore it off, and pussyfooted down the stairs. Buffy was going to be all right. Be a while, a _long_ while even, but seeing her sister again seemed to have snapped her out of it, whatever _it_ ’d been. Blood called to blood, and all that. Best that he made himself scarce. Niblet needed some time alone with big sis, and vice versa, and theirs was the kind of tearful, heartfelt reunion best unspoiled by the awkward third-wheel of a not-so-secret-torch-carrying vampire.

He was relieved that Dawn hadn’t drilled him with twenty questions about Buffy’s return, not that he would’ve been able to cough up any answers himself. Just making it up as he went along, was all.

At Buffy’s grave she’d screamed until she’d run out of breath and lost consciousness again (and Spike’s ears had rung for sodding ever after that), at which point he’d thrown her into the back of the DeSoto (battling a nasty sense of déjà vu in the process), resolving to get her home first, then suss out the rest later. As dictated by Murphy’s Law, she’d come to in the car a couple of miles shy of 1630 Revello Drive. Her panic-induced attempt to first jump out of the speeding car, then, failing that (due to Spike’s foresight to having buckled her in), to sodding fight Spike for its control, had nearly caused him to crash the DeSoto and kill them both. In the brief history of vamp-led rescues, this had got to be the worst.

He’d scarcely managed to get both of them home unscathed, but the DeSoto’s grille had paid the price—a new dent the size and shape of a handicapped parking sign, outlined with bits of fade-resistant, blue reflective paint.

Not that he’d cared. Not with the prize being Buffy alive and more or less in one piece, at least physically. As for psychologically...well. She’d alternated between fits of delirium and brief reprieves of lucidity, cowering in terror then lashing out feebly but indiscriminately in her weakened confusion, like a trapped, wild animal sensing the end of her days. Nailing the whole crazy bint act that’d have given Drusilla a run for her money.

What was a vamp to do, best intentions and all? What with both of them looking like sodding rejects from a mud wrestling contest, Spike had thought, hell, nothing like a hot shower to chase the chills away and set ‘em both to sorts.

It’d seemed like a brilliant idea at the time.

Shaking his head, he let out a derisive chuckle at himself. Brilliant. Right. That should’ve been the first clue. But he’d been running on empty, and with adrenaline dictating most of his actions, the intoxicating scent of pure Buffy from her injuries calling for the rise of his demon had just about blown his circuit. Biting his own cheek could only go so far towards providing temporary relief.

So some distance was probably best. Alone at last, he let his game face fall in shamed defeat, and raided the fridge for what was permitted of a vamp on the straight and narrow. Taking it out on the blood bags was an act without honor, but it wasn’t like anyone would bother to check the trash for evidence of his savage beast concealed within. Three bags of cold, vile pig swill later, with his hunger leashed and settling below the surface of his swelling self-hatred, he knew it was doing its job. Even the blood-splattered kitchen counter gave him a perverted sense of pride.

“Oooh, you have sexy ridges on!”

The Bot’s bright, brilliant smile and sing-song voice jolted him like a sodding kick in the gut. He sputtered, more blood dribbling down his chin.

“Not now,” he managed to spit out, turning his head away, because nobody deserved to bear witness to his moment of weakness, not even a machine.

Undeterred, _it_ took a step forward. “I could wait for you downstairs,” it said, its coquettish voice making his stomach turn. “Since the other me has my bed and you didn’t want me up there.”

“You leave her alone!” he growled, then at its flinch, added as contrition set in, “Please.”

“Well…” the Bot seemed to reconsider, then brightened. “I could patrol!”

“Yeah, sure. Knock yourself out.”

Spike made sure it’d left, marching out of the house confidently with a battle cry of, “Vampires beware!” before he limped down squeaky stairs to the basement to crawl into his narrow cot. Having finally liberated his raging erection, he stretched out on his back, one arm comfortably folded behind his head. He’d saved the best for last, he had, and now, _now_ , he finally allowed himself to indulge in a replay of the delicious hour he’d shared with Buffy alone.

* * *

In the blackest hour of the night, with the full moon at the zenith, he let the memory wash over him and consume him whole—

Not the most promising of beginnings, that. His stripping the Slayer of her tattered and blood-stained burial garb, in her bathroom with the frilly girly wallpaper and too many personal products with sharp chemicals that stood in for coconut or vanilla or strawberry that made his nose itch. While she hugged herself for the warmth that wouldn’t come, looking so utterly lost that even _he_ couldn’t ignore the alarm bells going off in his head.

“Let’s get you warm, love,” he said, trying to one-up the stifling silence, knowing by now not to expect a response.

Never had he witnessed the Slayer resigned to the fate of a victim. Even at her most desperate, even on Glory’s tower and mere steps away from her death, in the aftermath of the worst failure of his unlife (always so bloody vivid in the back of his mind as if it were yesterday), she’d been serene, and strong; she’d been a general leading her troops to victory, an undefeated warrior actualizing her self-sacrifice as the most brazen two-finger salute to the sodding universe. _Checkmate_.

But then the delicious sensory overload of _Buffyness_ threatened to drown out cohesive thoughts, calling forward other, stock-piled memories and senses. They overlapped and intermingled with cashmere sweaters (whisper-soft), stolen thongs (delicate _and_ potent), bruised chocolates (the bitch!), and choked passion (unspilled blood, like unwritten poetry). All in culmination to unrequited love, love in its most familiar and punishing form.

As if on cue, the erection he’d been fighting all night got a second wind, straining hard into the zipper of his jeans. Not getting the memo that this was to be a platonic bath before sending Buffy off to her beddy-bye, and not an erotic prelude to slipping her into something a little more comfortable just so that he could tear it off her eager body, dewy wet and glistening from the shower and anticipation.

“I’m a saint,” he snickered, shaking his head in disbelief. “William the bloody, goddamned saint.”

He rolled all of his impotent rage into shoving the shower curtain out of the way, turned on the shower, and slapped the inside of the bathtub. Aiming for an even tone, with some semblance of success, he managed to say, “In you go then, easy peasy.”

Buffy looked at the gushing shower head, and looked back at him expectantly. “William,” she whispered.

Was she remembering? The jolt of joy that shot through him dissipated just as quickly when he searched her eyes and found only blankness where recognition should be. Just repeating what he’d said, was all. “Uh…” he raked his fingers through his hair, damp from the shower steam. This was going to turn out _exactly_ like leading a horse to water, wasn’t it?

“Right then.” Just his luck that everything would have to be done the hard way (and goddammit he was _not_ thinking about his cock). He kicked off his boots, peeled off his socks and his t-shirt, and rolled up his jeans. As usual he wore nothing underneath, and he wasn’t about to let out the monster (damn right!).

“Like this. Like”—he winced—“like William.” He stepped into the far end of the bathtub and offered her his hand, then guided her in to face him such that the shower stream came down on her back. Buffy let out a soft gasp when the water made contact with her body, then leaned back and relaxed her posture, her last shivers subsiding under the hot spray.

For a moment he’d just stared, gormless and gobsmacked, nostrils flaring, taking in the sight that reenacted an embarrassingly recurrent dream, saturating his lungs with the potent richness that was Buffy’s scent. Steam had risen from her heated flesh as the spray continued to pelt her neck, her back, bunching her hair and hugging the curves of her body to stream down her legs, mapping tantalizing, dangerous territory.

His knees threatened to buckle, but he was made of sterner stuff, dammit, so he held his breath and stood his ground. The swirls at the bottom of the bathtub seemed to have caught Buffy’s attention, and she watched, totally fascinated, as the brown tinged with red first pooled at her feet, before sluicing into the drain behind her.

“ _For dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return._ ” Some fucking ancient Sunday School drivel had the nerve to rise from nowhere to Spike, but it didn’t really describe the situation, did it? “No,” he rejected it with vehemence, picking up a sponge from the corner shower basket, and worked a dollop of a bodywash curiously named “Tahitian Passion” into a lather. “Dust _I_ am. But _you_ , Slayer, you’re somethin’ else.”

He coaxed the arms wrapped around her body to relinquish their grip, and began tracing her delicate contours with an even more delicate touch.

“Dust is what you make of the nightmares that haunt other humans.” He dabbed the sponge over her flushed cheeks, stroked the elegance of her neck to the hollow of her throat, and traced the tautness of her clavicle to her heaving chest. From under her lashes, Buffy peered up to meet his gaze.

“Dust is what you render demons into that dare cross your path.” He picked up her dominant hand, avoiding the bruised knuckles, and lathered up the wrist, the forearm, the elbow, to the shoulder that had borne the weight of the world, then down the other arm. He paid no mind to the water splashing on his chest and traveling down his jeans-clad legs.

“From dust you emerge, and out of dust you triumph.” Without taking his eyes off her, he reached behind her to glide the sponge over her shoulder blades, across the tightness of her back, down the strength of her spine to the swell rising from either side of its base.

“Dust is what lies beneath you, what’s destined for your enemies.” He tapped her heart with the sponge, but it was the nipples that rose up to beg his attention, short-circuiting his brain. He couldn’t exactly deny them their due, and with the rest of his speech forgotten, he thought he might as well try to recoup what remained of his evil image. After all (as his jeans could attest), he was still the Big—well, maybe not _Bad_ anymore, but certainly— _Something_ , but the caresses he bestowed upon the soft curves of her breasts bore a gentleness that belied his passion.

As he grazed one nipple she closed her eyes and arched her back, causing rivulets of foam and bubbles to surge across the plane of her midsection to be caught by the soft brown curls below, where their descent, momentarily halted, gathered in strength to leap into a waterfall. Spike’s unbeating heart leaped into his throat. His hand followed the water’s journey to linger slightly at her center before painting each leg with the sponge, all the way to her wiggling toes. Never mind that he was crouching in the shower in his jeans, sopping wet, like a pathetic fool.

Were it not for her hitched breath and racing pulse he would’ve hated himself for it, a moment of stolen, guilty pleasure, a sizable pothole while he was supposedly taking the high road. Her scent and proximity made his brows twitch and his fangs itch. He clenched his jaws and his hands, and swallowed the saliva flooding his mouth.

He’d been a willing masochist in Dru’s sadistic games many a time, but this…tease with no relief in sight was a torture of a different kind, and of his own making. All this, and he hadn’t even got to shampooing her hair yet—that golden silk with its gravity-defying bounce. Was he digressing? Must be the bodywash, intoxicating scent with a name like one of those cocktails that Darla had favored in the roaring twenties…

He was vaguely aware of Buffy’s heartbeat getting closer, almost vibrating his eardrums, until he registered that she was bending down slowly to take the sponge from his hand. Perhaps it was the steam fogging up his vision, but as their eyes connected (he could only imagine his as being full of raw hope and naked longing—he could be such a _jerk_ sometimes), he felt a fragile intimacy between them. Was that a flicker of recognition? A hint of understanding? Buffy grimaced, almost a smile. That was a start, right?

Next he knew, she was pulling him up to a standing position from worshipping at her feet, where he belonged and tenderly, raising the sponge to wipe one side of his forehead while he dumbly stared. Showing him the grime, she said something that made him want to clutch her to his chest and _weep_ :

“Not dust. Not today.”

* * *

That shower had been just one happy ending short of a wet dream, an easy thing for his imagination to fix. In the privacy of the basement, his hand had followed his blood to his cock, gliding gently at first, smooth as the silky touch of Buffy’s hair. Nice ‘n’ slow soon turned into fast and earnest, as the mental image morphed from the tease into an enthusiastic hands-on exploration, with Buffy’s fingers curved tightly around his shaft, pulling in rhythm with her heartbeat, causing his blood to surge in time with hers. He felt himself swell further, if that was possible. No longer holding back, he vamped out to better recall her scent from the back of his throat. It was nothing but surrender at that point, as he pictured scooping up an armful of willing Buffy to straddle his body, gazing into her eyes as she leaned back against the wall and maneuvered his sensitive tip against her quivering opening.

His hips rose up from the bed as she lowered herself onto him, inch by painstaking inch, and the heat that gloved him left him all but breathless. He pumped with all the passion of a dream renewed, of hope for the most hopeless of an existence, of carefully preserved memories of her delicious moans of pleasure from that one time, the only time they’d been together, but oh, Buffy’s back now, he’d cradled her body, pumped her heart beneath his palms, breathed life into her lungs, then borrowed her body heat, even tasted her blood; Buffy, his beautiful Slayer, sun goddess, sex kitten, golden warrior—

When the edge rushed towards him he didn’t jump, he soared, higher and higher to such an altitude that the air thinned and he was sure the sun would blind and melt him, but the heat felt so good, and falling brought such sweet release. Coming back down he wallowed in the satiation, with his blood still singing, _Buffy, Buffy, Buffy…_ , and his fantasy so sharp in his mind he could taste it on his tongue. He kept his eyes screwed shut to fend off reality, and permitted drowsiness to gradually overtake him, even if first light was still hours away. There was a niggling thought at the back of his mind, overlaid on top of the continuation of his favorite dream, of something important, something he was neglecting. A slippery thing—whatever it was, fading faster than blood was being restored back to his brain, that he thought he might as well take the path of the least resistance. It was clearly pointless to try to sort it out until he’d had a bit of a kip.

When the dream grabbed his attention again he gave up the fight and let it pull him deeper, into the best sleep he’d had in a hundred and forty-seven days.

  


~ To Be Continued ~


	14. The Pale Cast of Thought

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The post-resurrection morning. A mostly domestic scene closing with a hint of trouble. Buffy, Spike, Dawn, featuring the Buffybot. An attempt at humor because the alternative would’ve been too depressing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is from Act III, Scene 1 of _Hamlet_ by Shakespeare:
> 
> And thus the native hue of resolution  
> Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,  
> And enterprises of great pith and moment  
> With this regard their currents turn awry,  
> And lose the name of action.
> 
> ...which No Fear Shakespeare has kindly explained to modern readers as:
> 
> “Fear of death makes us all cowards, and our natural boldness becomes weak with too much thinking. Actions that should be carried out at once get misdirected, and stop being actions at all.” ([x](http://nfs.sparknotes.com/hamlet/page_140.html))

* * *

They gazed at each other, Buffy and her mirror image, in identical battle stance, from across the landscape. It was all supernaturally misty and dissolving into nothingness around the edges. Buffy directed an eyeroll skyward. Typical. Whoever was writing her TV movie-of-the-week life had better scale way back on the melodrama. All that was missing from achieving a complete over-the-top cheesy horror movie setup was the spooky soundtrack.

By Slayer instinct or years of fighting experience, they drew closer, circling each other in the pre-battle tension. No familiar tingling set off Buffy’s Slayer senses, which was a relief. Whatever the doppelgänger was, she wasn’t Buffy’s vamped future self come back Terminator-style to assassinate herself, thank God. Because a vampire slayer dying at her own time-traveling vampire’s fangs? How weird would that be? Would that mean she would sire herself? And was _sire_ one of those gender-neutral terms when it applied to vampires but then what was _dam_? Buffy reigned in her random scattered-brain thoughts. That couldn’t be her, because the silence was driving her _crazy_. She cleared her throat. “You gonna say—”

“Enssslaved no more,” rasped her lookalike, setting off whispers of echoes, “no more, no more, no more…”

“And there’s the cryptic. How predictable.” Shaking off goosebumps, Buffy sidestepped to the right, and reached on the sly for Mr. Pointy tucked into her waistband. Better safe than sorry, right?

The whites of The Other Buffy’s eyes gleamed, as did the wicked blade of the battle-axe she swung with practiced ease.

“Oh, good, you’ve brought a weapon.” Evil twin it was, then. Buffy flashed her a mock smile, concealing the panic that swept through her body when her stake hand came up empty. “I’d have been offended if you hadn’t.”

The evil twin lunged, the “whoosh” of her swing menacing as it sliced through air inches away from Buffy’s head. Buffy reacted automatically, rolling behind her and lightning quick, pivoting into a sweep kick. Her opponent leapt up and over, effortlessly high, and wow, was she fast. _Faster_ , in fact. No sooner did the thought enter Buffy’s head than pain exploded between her shoulder blades. She arched her back reflexively and crashed forward onto her knees, agony pulsating down her arms in time with her heartbeat.

Before she could think of the next move, the air shifted again, but the expected death blow did not come. A cool blade forced her chin up, so that their eyes were locked onto each other. The other, the Not-Buffy, croaked, “Shhhadows rise and shackles fall. We…are bound no more.”

She paused meaningfully, her eyes searching Buffy’s as if expecting that mumble jumble to mean something to her. When all Buffy did was try to stare her down, the Not-Buffy let the battle-axe drop into the mist rising from the ground. Buffy shifted her gaze to its battle-worn smooth handle for a split second; when she looked up again, the other was gone.

* * *

“Wakey wakey! Hope you’re hungry!” 

Buffy slowly opened her eyes, images of a ferocious lookalike quickly fading to the real life vision of a smorgasbord of the best of stove-free cooking, and Dawn’s face with an ear-to-ear smile. Shuffling into a sitting position, she narrowly avoided a collision between her feet and a heavy tray of foodstuff plopped down on the comforter. Dawn’s hand guided hers to something cold and wet. She looked down: a glass.

Dawn tapped the glass with a one-two clink, and proudly sing-songed, “Two parts orange, one part grapefruit—just the way you like it.” Dawn tapped the glass with a one-two clink, sing-songy voice full of pride.

Next, Buffy was presented with a plate. Dawn narrated, “PB&J with crunchy, not creamy, peanut butter and strawberry jelly, no crust, and cut diagonally to match my masterfully-folded napkin triangle.” The plate dropped unevenly on the comforter as Buffy failed the passing of the baton, then struggled to keep up with the following part of Dawn’s show-and-tell.

“...cup of M&M’s, just because.” Dawn popped a few of them into her mouth, producing a series of satisfying crunches, then threw a rejected green one back into the bowl. “Pickles…”—she shifted another bowl to the back—“Okay, these are for me. Itsy bitsy baby cucumbers are adorable, not to mention being both a vegetable and a condiment. Aaaand for dessert”—she lifted the porcelain butter dish cover in a dramatic reveal—“ta-da! Rice Krispies drizzled in Hershey’s chocolate sauce! Huh? How cool am I?”

Her sister’s beaming face beckoned a response, and Buffy tried to make sense of the swirl of bright colors that swam before her struggling eyes. A ring of light seeped through around the curtains, casting pale shadows on the ceiling and the opposite wall. She was in her own bedroom. It’d been a dream, a Slayer dream, part and parcel of her wonderful Slayer gift that kept on giving. Uhm, what was it that the other her had said? “Shadows rise and shackles fall.”

“What’s that?” Dawn’s smile faltered for just a split second, then returned wider-than-ever-before, stretching her cheeks taunt.

But Buffy caught the panic in Dawn’s too-large eyes, and the like-for-like emotions of sympathy and self-pity hit her like a paralyzing jolt: She was _alive_ , remarkable because she hadn’t been. She was kind of getting the treatment of the prodigal son, only it was her little sister who’d been left behind, not to mention the supernatural twist to her story.

Nevertheless, her sister had made her breakfast. She schooled her expression into a smile that she hoped broadcasted gratitude and reassurance.

“Would you look at that! My baby sister’s babying me. Well, dig in! You can help me eat!” Dawn hopped on the bed and giggled. When she grabbed one of the peanut butter and jelly triangles, Buffy followed suit, testing the sugary filling oozing out from between the bread slices with the tip of her tongue. It was…sweet. Overpoweringly so. Then she remembered…

“School!” Buffy blurted out. “You can’t skip school just because I’m—” _Brought back from the dead._ She jumped off the bed, ready for action, while her mind lagged behind on step-by-step instructions for appearing as a responsible adult and a proponent against teenage truancy.

“Relax, Buffy! It’s Sunday.”

“Oh. No school on Sunday.” She sank down on the bed with a shrug. “Boy, coming back from the dead is even worse than coming back from Europe.”

Dawn flinched, eyes instantly swelling up.

_Sooo not funny._ Grimacing, Buffy reached out to rub Dawn’s arm. “Too soon?”

“Love”—came Spike’s deep baritone and the sisters looked up in sync to see him lean casually against the door frame—“I’m _still_ dead and even _I_ felt the sting on that one.”

With his head tilt, the whole room tilted, and Buffy fought the dizzying wave of… _something_ by turning her gaze to her bandaged hands, an impressionist watercolor of crimson and pink on white. She had the simultaneous sensation of blood draining away from her head and rushing to her face, and oh God, what was _with_ her fixation with blood in the presence of a soulless vampire? She shoved the thought out of her mind, and disinvited it for good measure.

“Spike! The sun’s—” She threw an urgent glance at the curtains.

“High in the sky, last time I checked. Never stopped me.” Did he just puff out his chest? Muscles rippled under a black tee a size too small. She looked away before their gazes met.

“Uh-huh,” said Dawn, hopping off the bed to circle him, then promptly covered her nose. “You just reek of sunshine. Wait, make that sewage, instead.” She took a step back. “You do reek, though. Feel free to make use of the shower.” She wrinkled her nose. “Soonish.”

Did both of their heads jerk up at the mention of “shower”? Last night… She wasn’t ready to think about last night yet. The bed dipped, and she heard the soft clicking of pebbles bouncing off one another. Dawn had thrown herself back on the bed, and was intently picking M&M’s out of the bowl left with mostly green ones.

Sealing that part of her mind with yellow “CAUTION” tape, Buffy tried to pick up the conversation where it’d left. Sewage, blood, dead. She’d been dead. Worst conversation-starter ever. More like conversation-killer. She winced at her own bad pun.

“Uhm.” Clearing her throat, she put on her resolute face. Which was a little challenging given that she was sitting in bed in a black cami and pajama bottoms with little red hearts, an outfit she had picked out in a rush the night before by rummaging through bags of her clothes marked prominently for “GOODWILL.” No matter. She’d taken on far worse in less intimidating ensembles. “You didn’t just take a deadly stroll in the sun for the fun of it. Tell me what you know. What you found out.”

He hesitated, left hand subconsciously tracing the bottom of his duster jacket pocket, as if weighing the content within. Then, decision made, he straightened up and nodded. “Right. Took a field trip to the Magic Box. Had what you might call unfinished business with demon girl. Guess what?”

“What?” Dawn said right away, fingers frozen a couple of inches from her mouth, a red M&M in their clutch.

“No. Body’s. There.”

Dawn gasped. “But, Anya!” She continued breathlessly, “She’s missing prime money-making hours at the store.” She crunched on an M&M. “Most suspicious!”

“That’s the least of it.” Spike dragged a chair to the edge of the bed, then sat astride it. Forearms resting on the back on the chair, he trained his eyes on the floor as he said, “The backroom was set up for some serious spellcasting. Candles, sand, sacrificial bowl, herbs, crystals, blood. The whole nine yards. The air oozed black magic. Could smell it. Somethin’ major went down there.”

He dropped his hands to his knees and peered up at Buffy. “Last night.”

“You don’t think…” Buffy kneaded the tapered end of the comforter in her lap. “No, not the Scoobies. Not my _friends_.”

Silently, Spike retrieved the notebook from his deep pocket, turned it in his hands to orient it, then flipped to the last page. It flopped on the bed with a muted thud. Buffy pointedly looked away. She’d glimpsed its familiar purple edges, colored with a marker. She’d caught the cursive handwriting on the nameplate, decorated with a flourish of filigree in blue and red ink, the initial _W_ with drop cap styling in a proclamation of ownership. Her eyes burned. The letters wouldn’t merge into words, like hieroglyphs from a long dead language, lost over centuries. She knew what they meant, but she refused to acknowledge them, preferring to keep them in their most abstract form. Her fate had been etched in there, in color-coded efficiency, like an extra-credit assignment. It prescribed her life after death, in no uncertain terms, step-by-step, like a doctor’s order: _Cast spell in case of death, observe full moon for maximum strength, repeat as necessary, 3 more refills._ How exhausting.

Beside her, Dawn leaned in to study the notebook, then went still. After a moment, she said in a very quiet voice, “That bitch!”

“Language, Dawn.”

Dawn turned to her so fast the bed frame creaked. “Oh, come on! Don’t pretend you don’t blame her. Willow went behind my and Spike’s backs—”

“We don’t know she did it for sure! Maybe”—Buffy struggled to come up with alternative scenarios—“maybe it was just theoretical research, maybe she went along unwillingly—”

“Think you can rule out theoretical, and not just ‘cause I can still smell the herbs.” Spike leafed through the notebook, stopping to stab a page with a finger. “There. Original spell called for five practitioners. Our brilliant little Witch modified it for four.” He held it up, circling a diagram labeled with each spellcaster’s name: _Willow, Anya, Tara, Xander_. “Innit nice? No matter how you play spin the dummy, you land on a Scooby.” Spike shook his head and said in a dropped voice, “Color me impressed. Don’t know if I should thank her or throttle her. With this kind of mojo, be wise of me to stay the hell away…”

Dawn pushed off the bed. “I can’t believe they didn’t _tell_ us!” She punched her fury into the keypad of a cordless phone and started pacing, phone glued to one ear.

Buffy sank back against the propped up throw pillows. She couldn’t blame Willow, not when she’d harbored a similar wish for bringing back Mom. It just…didn’t seem fair. Why did Willow get to decide who got another lease on life? Why did _she_ get to be _chosen_ all over again? Was this just another day in the life of a Slayer on the Hellmouth? How come Giles had never bought up a _Do Not Resurrect_ form for her to sign?

Her eyes widened. Giles…probably still didn’t know.

“Buffy?” Spike was giving her that look again, tender, hopeful, earnest, full of…something that she couldn’t begin to reciprocate. Especially considering that she’d been six feet underground less than twenty-four hours ago. “Anything I can do for you, pet?” 

“Argh!” Dawn yelled in frustration, halting Buffy’s reply. “Nobody’s answering! And by nobody, I mean _everybody_. I’ve called Xander and Anya’s apartment, Xander’s work, Willow’s cell, the library where Tara works, even the Magic Box again, and nobody’s anywhere. It’s almost like they’ve all disappeared.” She chewed on her lower lip. “Or avoiding us. Can’t imagine why!” She laughed mirthlessly.

“Did you try Giles?”

Dawn and Spike shared a look. “Oh, uhm.” Dawn fidgeted with the phone. “After you uh…he went back to England.”

“He _abandoned_ you? So soon?” Finally landing on a target for her pent-up ire, she let it all out. “Oh, right. Slayer dead. Moving on. Nothing to see here. Splendid. Pip pip, cheerio! Did he even stay for the funeral?” Dawn and Spike exchanged another look. They did that a lot. Like mutual mind-reading ability. Like they’d developed some sort of rapport between them. _Wait._ “How long was I gone?”

“It’s been—” Dawn started counting on one hand, bending one finger then another finger, while Spike blurted out, “A hundred and forty-seven days.” Dawn lowered her hand. Buffy reeled, bumping her head hard on the headboard.

“Give or take,” he amended quickly, shoving his hands into his duster pocket. “Not that anyone’s counting.” He sent Dawn another look, a plea for help, apparently, because Dawn nodded imperceptibly, and ended the awkward silence by redirecting the heat Buffy’s way. Tentatively, walking back to bed where Buffy’s massaging the back of her head, she asked, “H-how long was it for you?”

Buffy shrugged. “A day. An eternity. Brief enough that the passage of time never registered. Yet long enough that things, memories—had started to fade.” She closed her eyes, trying to tease out reality from the perpetual dreamscape that’d been her afterlife, and reconcile that remembered feeling of completion with the fresh realization of its loss, possibly forever. “It was—” _Heaven. Everything I’d ever wanted._ “—nice, actually.”

She massaged her achy temples, realizing she’d let slip too much. Spike was watching her with rapt horror, and Dawn looked like a kicked puppy, all sad eyes, quivering lips and folding in on herself. How insensitive could she be? Describing leaving behind an orphaned kid sister—who already suffered from guilt and abandonment issues—as _nice_?

“Oh, Dawnie! I didn’t mean—”

The phone chose that second to ring, giving Buffy an excuse to pause and mull over her words. Saved by the bell, except—

“I got it!” At the cheerful shout from downstairs all of them jumped.

“Oh, no! It’s the Buffybot!” Dawn bolted out the door like a startled foal, with Spike and Buffy not far behind. Over the stampede of their rushing feet on hardwood floors, they heard the Bot chat agreeably, concluding the conversation with a perfectly delivered, “Okay! See you soon, Mrs. Rosenberg!”

“Mrs. Rosenberg?” Out of breath, Dawn swallowed, then gasped. “As in, Willow got _married_?”

“Willow got married?” The Bot’s eyes doubled in size, then narrowed in confusion. “That’s weird. Her mom said Willow was at the hospital. That’s a strange place to get married.” One hand spinning the slender phone absentmindedly like a stake, she continued, “She said she’ll be ‘popping right over’ to collect a few things for Willow.” With a bounce in her ponytail, she effortlessly caught the phone she’d tossed in the air and pressed it over where her heart would be, if she were human. She froze. “Why weren’t we invited to the wedding?”

Impatiently, Spike cut in, “Forget about the sodding wedding. Red’s in the hospital?”

“But Dawn said—”

“My mistake,” Dawn replied in a small voice. “There’s no wedding.”

The Bot looked like Christmas had just been canceled, while Buffy mentally caught up. “Willow’s been hurt! And her Mom coming over… Willow _lives_ here now?”

“Yeah, with Tara, in Mo—in the master bedroom. The house felt less spooky with them around.” Dawn turned to Buffy and picked up her hand. “I know it must be a shocker. So much has changed. But we made sure to keep your room _exactly_ the same, in case… I mean, for you.”

“But that’s where I’ve been recharging every night after I patrol with Spike!” the Bot objected. “I guess it’s yours now, I mean, _again_. Spike! Can I bunk with you?” She moved to wind her arm through Spike’s.

“Not bloody likely!” He dodged with vamp speed, leaving the Bot pouting.

“Bunk with…” Buffy felt like Rip Van Winkle returning to a life she no longer recognized. She wanted to discuss Willow, but her thoughts were a tangled mess. She rubbed her forehead to ease the spinning. “Does _Spike_ live here, too?”

“Made a promise to look after the Niblet, I did. ‘Til the end of the world. The world stands, for better or worse, so here I am.”

She hadn’t intended her words to sound accusatory; it was just so unexpected. But clearly, they’d been taken that way, as Dawn had rushed to attach herself to Spike’s side and nodded in agreement to his words like a bobblehead.

This, thought Buffy, was why dead people should stay dead. Confronted with signs that her sister had _not_ , as she’d feared, fallen into an orphan’s life of homeless destitution, she should be happy; yet she couldn’t help feeling just a little disappointed that everyone seemed to have moved on, or in this case, _moved in_ , coping with her death and adapting as best as they could, which was to say remarkably well. (With the noted exception of Willow, perhaps, looking so far like the mastermind of her resurrection.) She knew it was selfish of her, and immature. But it’d been _her_ death, and…well, she’d kind of expected life to stop, after that.

At any rate, it was safer to dwell on self-pity than to accept the shock that Spike had stayed for her, because of her, helping to shoulder the unglamorous responsibility of raising a teenage girl without any prospect of scoring brownie points with said girl’s big sister. Safer because Buffy needed to keep her head clear, and Spike…well, he tended to have the opposite effect on her head, not to mention other involuntary and equally unwanted effects on her body.

It was all a little too much. Actually, _a lot_ too much.

Time for some backpedaling. “That wasn’t—”

“No worries, Slayer,” Spike halted her apology, sweeping the unpleasantries away with a casual wave of his hand. How was it that lately at every interaction, he came out looking like the better man? Helpful and magnanimous and so unlike the evil creep that she’d grown to lo—

“No way! The fire from last night made the news!” Dawn exclaimed beside her, shaking folds out of the Sunnydale Herald and slapping it on the side table, effectively applying the emergency brake on Buffy’s runaway train of thought. One could always count on the Hellmouth to produce disasters to save oneself from some regrettable thinky thoughts.

Buffy’s hand found the arm of the sofa, and she leaned into it. A conversation has started behind her, somewhere far away, so it was of no immediate concern. Now that she’d closed her eyes, replacing the swirl of confusion surrounding her with a dull gray, her headache felt more manageable as well. Add a couple of good nights’ sleep, some decent food—pizza, not Dawn’s snack-a-rama meals—and a double latte, she’d feel good as new. She could do it. This living thing. Even the Slayer part. She’d done it all before. She was older and wiser and a better fighter—once she’d gotten back in shape. And what was the worst that could happen? Not like she hadn’t died, twice. _Bring it on._

Someone was reading—Spike, his tone urgent. She cocked an ear, finding his voice not altogether unpleasant:

“...is asking the public for help in solving the arson of the 700 block of Anacapa Street. Investigators continue to comb through the ashes of a series of suspicious fires that set the entire block ablaze last night, destroying an illegal drinking establishment, four abandoned houses, and several vacant warehouses.

“Two firefighters injured on the site of the five-alarm fire were treated at Sunnydale Memorial for smoke inhalation and minor burns and subsequently released. No other injuries or fatalities have been reported.

“A woman, seen exiting one of the warehouses, is sought by the Sunnydale Police Department for questioning. The white female is described as 16-25 years old, about 5’3”, small build, with long, blonde hair pulled into a ponytail.

“Anyone with information into the identity of the person of interest is asked to contact Detective Joseph Kimpo at…”

Eyes still shut against the world, Buffy zoned out. Such was life on the Hellmouth. If the apocalypse didn’t destroy the town, its residents would. Spike’s voice trailed off, and for a merciful, headache-free moment, nobody said anything, until the Bot piped up, as cheerful as ever:

“That’s a pretty sketch. Hey Buffy—I mean ReallyBuffy—she kinda looks like us!”

Buffy’s eyes snapped open.

 

_To be continued..._


	15. I Am Here Or There, Or Elsewhere

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Previously (Chs 13-14): Willow’s spell resurrects Buffy and renders the spell-casting Scoobies (Willow, Tara, Xander, and Anya) unconscious. A suspicious Spike aborts an out-of-town errand for Anya and with fortuitous timing, encounters a just-resurrected Buffy at her grave and brings her home. Interrupting Dawn’s sleep-over at Janice’s, Spike orchestrates a teary reunion between Buffy and Dawn. Afterwards, Spike recalls the hour spent alone with Buffy, including helping her with a shower (while demonstrating, perhaps to the reader’s disappointment, remarkable self-control), and in the privacy of his basement (and I think rather to the reader’s delight) finally allowing himself a bit of relief and release. The next morning starts with a mostly domestic scene with a hint of trouble. Spike shares his findings at the Magic Box with Buffy and Dawn: the remnants of a magical ritual, and Willow’s notebook opened to the resurrection spell. A suspect sketch released by investigators of last night's arson bears an uncanny resemblance to Buffy(bot).
> 
> And now, Ch 15: Buffy confronts the Scoobies at the hospital. Giles appeals to an old friend for help. Dawn and Spike each tries to unravel the mystery of last night’s arson.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title is taken from a poem by T. S. Eliot, quoted at the beginning of the chapter. Rated PG-13. Kudos to my wondrous beta All4Spike; you're the best!

**Chapter 15. I Am Here Or There, Or Elsewhere**

_Dawn points, and another day_  
_Prepares for heat and silence._  
_..._  
_I am here_  
_or there, or elsewhere. In my beginning._  
  
_\-- From "East Coker", by T. S. Eliot_

 

Anyaka bolted upright in bed, breathless, shaken. What a terrifying nightmare! She’d been reduced to a mere mortal in her dream! A stinking, powerless human! She shuddered in remembrance, a bitter aftertaste forming in her mouth at something so vile, she wouldn’t even joke about to Hallie.

She frowned, the hand cupping her throat trembling: her pendant—was missing.

Even more disturbingly, she appeared to be garbed in some rudimentary and ill-tailored form of clothing—with a drawstring!—that failed to provide sufficient cover for all her…assets. The bed sheets beneath her bare legs were of low-grade cotton worn thin by repeated washes. And the interior decor of her lodging was most distasteful, all institutional green and medically sterile. _Yuck._

She would have to pretend to assimilate until she could fully assess her situation. She poked the guy snoring softly in a rigid chair next to her bed.

“Fellow human! Wake up!”

“Huh?” The man rubbed his drowsy eyes, then sat up straight. “Anya! How you feelin’?”

 _Anya._ An-ya. Her assimilation name unleashed a rush of memories—utter nonsense, a bag of confusion, the stuff that nightmares are made of—back into her head. Xander was leaning forward, his own hospital-issued gown, the same shade of despair, parting over his widespread legs. His gaze mapped over her every inch, as if accounting for salvageable parts. Gasp! Her short-lived, breakable _human_ parts, some of which—she reassessed—would fetch a pretty penny on the black market in the demon part of down. Oh, Lord of Arashmaharr! She was one of _them_!

“I— Wh— I demand an explanation!” A headache more persistent than the after effects of teleporting was hammering her skull, merciless as her work ethic. Given the human body’s abysmal capacity for toxins, was it any wonder that she was hung over? She couldn’t recall a thing from last night, but she wasn’t D'Hoffryn’s favorite for nothing. She could think on her feet, and…off her feet, too. Clearly, this had been a wild party that ended with…role playing? But of course! “I know you have a thing for nurses,” she grumbled, relieved that _something_ finally made sense. “But this uniform is hardly sexy—”

Xander laughed, a half cough. He cupped her cheeks tenderly and pulled her into a bear hug. “Oh, thank God you’re all right. My Anya…”

Anya didn’t mind the hug. He had nicely-sized arms, toned, and pleasant to the touch. She remembered him, of course she did. Just…not everything at once. And the part of him traditionally concealed on a fully grown human, but not so much by the awkward hospital gown at present, well, she recognized by sight, and granted renewed approval in her head.

Because humans had a thing for interrupting couples at their most intimate, there came a knock at the door, and a tentative, “Hi…”

Anya peeked from under Xander’s arm. “Oh, hi, Buffy!”

See? She remembered names. It was the Buffybot, whom Anya liked the best of the bunch. Predictable, straight-forward, cheerful and similar to her, frequently and unfairly called out as an habitual offender of social faux pas. Trailing behind her, with eyes averted, was Willow’s girl wrapped in an oversized bathrobe so big she threatened to disappear into it, whose name started with a T. Tina or something.

“How you feeling?” said the Bot, looking uncomfortable, probably confused by Anya’s display of human frailty. Who could blame her?

“Good!” she said, palms smoothing the pilling polyester blanket draped over her lower body. The inexpensive texture was all sorts of wrong. Could they see through her fake cheer? Just to be extra convincing, she amended, “Terrific!”

Xander shot her a look that would’ve earned him an evisceration had she had her powers. “Anh… You were knocked out.” He waved his giant hands vaguely in the air, as if they were a pair of sea stars wrestling with something invisible but strong. “So was I. You can’t possibly be terrific.”

Tina had sidled up to Xander with a whispered, “Are you OK?” and other inconsequential trivialities about mortal pain and such. So boring, Anya didn’t bother to eavesdrop. 

She whipped her head to face Buffy, testing the limp flatness of her bed hair in a covert flip. The liftless brush against her shoulder confirmed her horror: she was sporting a two-day old hairdo. “What brings you here, Buffy?”

Never in a thousand years could she have foreseen the Bot’s response. “Trying to figure out how I’m alive,” said Buffy, the corners of her lips doing that ambiguous Mona Lisa thing, a half smile enveloped in a downturned shadow. “As in, not dead anymore. Since last night. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

Okay, not the Bot? Yet her glare sweeping over the room was machine cold.

* * *

 

It was at the tail end of the fourth ring, when Giles dreaded the soft click of the answering machine, that the phone was picked up on the other side.

“Evening greetings,” came the calm voice, the end rising slightly with hope and infinite possibility.

Giles let out a breath he didn’t know he had held. “Eldrida.”

The slightest pause preceded hearing his name in return. “Rupert. I hope I have not kept you waiting. I’ve just concluded this evening’s civil twilight celebration to end the day in peace.”

Giles automatically glanced at the sweeping second hand on his watch, its chronometer-certified precision applying ridiculous and meaningless accuracy to the measurement of human activities. Should the earth one day fall to an apocalypse, he would be able to pronounce and chronicle its doom to the precise half second for later generations that wouldn’t exist.

He cleared his throat. “And what a day—given the news from Sunnydale. Buffy—the Slayer, is resurrected.”

Another thoughtful pause, then Eldrida continued, “The full moon. Mercury in retrograde. We’re transitioning from summer to winter, day ceding to night. Ah, of course, you know what this means.” Her voice remained composed, unvarying, as if she’d been given nothing more than a routine weather report, instead of earth-shattering news, the kind that made or broke prophecies.

“No, I don’t bloody—” Giles curbed his outburst, shaking his head to clear it. “For Heaven’s sake, will you for but one brief moment quit thinking like a Wiccan Elder and look at it as a human being!”

“And allow my judgement to be clouded by emotion, as you have?”

Giles pounded his forehead with a fist that trembled with restrained power. Her even-tempered voice fed his fury in a way that frightened even him, so he held his tongue.

Eldrida sighed, as if to concede his point. “I’m aware of your history with the young woman in question, Rupert. You have my sympathy on this matter. However, you know as well as I do that my assistance—which you seek—is most valuable without the impediment of emotional attachment. While we walk on a common Earth, the Coven has pledged our resources to the Council out of a sense of duty—”

“No! Not the Council. Until I know more about the situation…” How would the Council react to the resurrection of the Slayer that’d been a persistent thorn in Quentin’s side? Giles shuddered, then pleaded again, “Not the Council.”

“A personal favor off the record?” Eldrida’s voice dropped to a mere whisper. She sounded amused. “You possess the Talent. You know a Reading performed with concealed intent may very well distort the results. We may be granted only a touch, a single tap into the magical energy that turns the universe, an eternal life force that goes in cycles, a rhythm beyond the understanding of you and me. It rises, it falls, with no apparent regard—”

“Please!” Giles tried to ignore the rhythm of the pulsing vein at his temple. “Eldrida, please, will you help?”

* * *

 

Dawn dredged her spork through the tomato alphabet soup in search of the next letter. Everybody knew that alphabet soup should be consumed in alphabetical order for maximum fun. The letter D was particularly tricky because the squishy, broth-softened letter often resembled the O, or the number 0. Such a shapeshifting pretender.

Speaking of pretenders… Dawn peered at the Buffybot from under her lashes, the arson report from the _Sunnydale Herald_ fresh and heavy on her mind. Did the Bot do it and…forget…or neglect to mention it? Was a machine capable of deception?

The Bot was whistling while folding fresh laundry at the end of the dining table, covering the hardwood surface with neat piles. It took Dawn a moment to recognize the familiar, upbeat tune; it was _Whistle While You Work_.

“Sooooo…” Dawn gave the soup another stir, aiming for casual. “Did anything memorable happen last night? You know, on patrol?” She gulped down a spoonful of soup, slurping on the word _patrol_. It came out sounding suspiciously like _parole_. Her face flushed.

The Bot shrugged. “It was a quiet night. No vampires to be seen in Shady Hill or Sunnydale Main.” She folded a t-shirt from the laundry basket in one slick move, some trick she’d picked up from a Japanese video on YouTube that Dawn just couldn’t get right no matter how hard she tried.

Both Shady Hill Cemetery and Sunnydale Cemetery were nowhere near the warehouse district where the arson took place. Wait, no vampires? Dawn frowned. “Like, zero? Is that typical?”

“Nope. I average 9.621 vampires and 0.833 demons per night. The median is 7 vampires and 0 demon. Would you like a full report of my Slaying records database? I can calculate the standard deviation for both categories if you’re interested.”

“Uhm, no thanks.”

The Bot folded a pair of Dawn’s knee-high socks into an impossible origami square, and added it to a stack. Okay, maybe _impossible_ was not the right word, for a robot. The Bot didn’t act like she was hiding anything, so Dawn decided to try a direct approach.

“You didn’t…I mean, by chance, _see_ the fire. Did you?” 

“It wasn’t visible given my relative location,” said the Bot, folding a couple of towels into a stuffed dog, clearly having watched too many instructional videos online. “Fire is dangerous. The first step after discovering a fire is to evacuate the area, and contact the local fire department.” Her hand plucking the ears of the towel puppy stopped abruptly, hovering above the left ear. “Oh!”

The spork dropped out of Dawn’s hand. “What?”

The Bot leaned over the table, towel puppy punctuating the air with each syllable as she said, “Never use the elevator in a fire. Take the stairs.”

Dawn snickered, relaxing. “Thanks for the PSA.”

“You’re welcome,” smiled the Bot brightly.

The soup had gone lukewarm. Dawn sucked down the rest of the tomato goodness in one go, then pushed the bowl aside. Try as she might, she couldn’t let the matter go. She leaned back, folding her arms over her chest to show her determination in getting to the bottom of the matter. “Okay, calculate this. If _you_ didn’t do it, and Buffy was home all night, then who’s the woman in the police sketch?”

“Well, it’s not something you can calculate. It’s more of an inference, but Occam's razor indicates…” The Bot froze for a moment, expressionless while Dawn could practically hear the microchips churning away under her silicon skin. “Does your sister suffer from somnambulism?”

“Some _what_?”

“Also called noctambulism, it’s a disorder that falls under the parasomnia family. While asleep, patients are able to perform activities that usually require a state of full consciousness. Oh!” She brightened. “You may know it as sleepwalking.”

* * *

 

A vamp could get around Sunnydale in broad daylight just fine, if he was thus inclined, and creative. And Spike was—on both accounts. Especially armed with the trusty blanket he’d newly enhanced with triple layers of lightweight, high-SPF, ripstop tent fabric. (He’d always prided himself on learning and adapting, taking advantage of new technology.) So after he watched the Witch’s mum drive off with a pensive Buffy, heading to the hospital for the Slayer and the Slayerettes’ little I-can’t-believe-it’s-not-the-Bot reunion (still not convinced she was right in insisting going without him as backup), well…the last thing he wanted to do was to sit idly by on his two hands.

For one thing, they itched for action. Granted, some of the actual itching could be attributed to the healing—magic silently flowing through the borrowed blood in his veins to mend torn flesh and bruised bones—but the urge for violence remained the same. He’d fared worse from a bar brawl, but the bloodied reminder of the events of last night—trauma from finding his beloved Slayer brought back to life in her coffin, exhuming her tooth and nail, literally—tormented him in a way that begged relief with whatever means necessary. As a rule, he wore battle wounds and scars as proud badges of honor and proofs of an unlife lived to its full potential. Even so, regrowing fingernails that’d lifted clean off? Hurt like a bitch.

With the Buffybot dogging his steps and rubbing that oblivious smile in his face, he’d had to restrain himself from forcibly wiping it off her plastic face with his fists. It didn’t take long for his patience to wear thin. Then he left Little Sis in the safeguard of the Bot and headed straight for the warehouse district.

The destruction was, he admitted with begrudging admiration, devastating and complete. Elegantly executed. With surgical precision. No tell-tale blackened exteriors to shock and awe casual passers-by, no smoldering half-structure to be salvaged, with wafts of smoke to add dramatic flair. No singed antique furniture to stand stoically against a backdrop of carnage. No evidence to sort through, either.

This was no common arson. Like the other classical elements, fire was notoriously hard to control or even predict. What it incinerated, what it spared...yielded to no human will, but took on an almost-organic form in its destructive path. Retrace its progress in reverse, like following a leaf on the vine to its root, and you’d eventually discover the fire’s origin, the destruction’s epicenter. But this...looked like no earthly fire. It looked simply as if the entire block had ignited at once, consuming everything within neatly drawn property lines. There should be something left of the block—two-story-high metal beams, remnants of fireproof furniture, trinkets as proof of lives disrupted—perhaps misshapen and blackened from heat, but certainly not consumed in their entirety. But everywhere he looked, he found only an ocean of ashes.

Hang on. Not just ashes. A hundred years of seeking out worthy opponents in a fight and disposing unworthy ones without blinking an eye, he knew vamp dust when he saw it.

From the shelter of his vamp-special blanket, Spike closed his eyes and inhaled sharply, filling his lungs to capacity, even sticking out his tongue for good measure. The real sport was in teasing apart the myriad layers of smells: artificial, metallic, and organic; smoky, pungent, sweet. Sorting out what mattered, discarding meaningless distractions. Finally, he latched onto a familiar scent that made him nauseous: Willy, the treacherous coward. Regrettably, the two-faced vermin’s human soul might restrain Spike’s fists, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to get his just deserts.

* * *

 

_Trying to figure out how I’m alive. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?_

With Buffy’s question hanging in the air, for a moment, everybody just stared.

Saying something would be of the good, except Xander wasn’t sure which of the words—there were _many_ words, right?—applied to the situation at hand. His memories were all a jumble, but he distinctly remembered burying her—in one of Joyce’s crisp dresses, in a coffin hastily made but made with love by him, in a quiet patch of green at the edge of town, fit for eternal rest for Sunnydale’s best. Yet here she stood, if not kicking, still very much alive. His brain saw it fit to regurgitate a flashback to high school, calling up Mrs. Franklin’s disapproval over his failed pop quizzes, her lips pressed thin and resolute, a permanent frown carved into the space between her eyes. Buffy’s penetrating gaze swept over them in quiet judgement in a similar fashion, and Xander swallowed, hard.

Not even the all-encompassing Hallmark cards—his go-to source for everyday wisdom—had a line for this occasion. Should one say, “Happy resurrection”? Or, more to the point, “Sweet Mother of God, are you real? And not evil, right? Sorry but I have to ask”?

Just before the silence grew awkward, his girl spoke up. “I didn’t do it,” Anya said flatly. “That’s the truth. Not even vengeance demons have powers of resurrection. It’s easy to take a life, sure, and lots of ways to do it. But restoring one? Never been done.”

He blinked. _What?_

Catching Xander’s look—he couldn’t even begin to imagine what funhouse mirror distortion his face sported by this point—Anya chuckled nervously, then added in a rush, “ _Before_ —I meant before I lost my power. Obviously. Now I just sell ingredients for lesser spells to warlock-wanna-be’s, and price-inflated crystals as lucky charms to the superstitious. All for human money.”

But those were the wrong words. Xander was sure of it. Was nobody going to welcome Buffy back? In a few strides he’d crossed the room and thrown his arms around his friend, not caring that he’d upended the chair in his rush to stand up, the dull thud but a faint echo comparing to the booms thumped out by his heart. “Buffy! You’re...back!” At the tentative pat from Buffy, he tightened his arms around his friend. Slayer, class protector, favorite superhero—was she always this small? He thought he heard Anya mumble, “I thought _I_ was the girlfriend”, but he was determined not to let any of Anya’s crazytalk ruin the moment. “God, am I glad to see you!”

“Yeah…uhm,” said Buffy, her back stiff. “Not sure how I feel yet. I’m still miffed to be here at all.”

Xander let go of her at those words. She might look small and frail, but she sure knew how to land a hit where it’d hurt the most. Regardless of how she came back, wasn’t it a _good_ thing that she _was_ back? What was with the accusatory tone?

“Maybe you haven’t noticed, Buff, but we’re not doing so hot ourselves. Waking up in the hospital ranks pretty low on Xander’s old fun-o-meter. But I sure am thankful that I did wake up. How about you not look a gift life in the mouth, huh?”

Oh, if looks could kill. “A...gift,” Buffy repeated. “You calling my resurrection a gift? What gave you the right to decide who lives, who dies, who rests in peace, and who gets yanked back to another non-negotiable term of Chosen duty? You presumptuous—”

“Whoa, whoa!” The quick escalation shocked him, and even as his stubborn mouth wanted to press forward, his feet were in full retreat mode, and he had to flatten his palm against the cold hard wall for support. She’d rather be dead? And she blamed… He tried not to take her words personally, brushing aside memories of the other time that he’d revived her, in Old Batface’s underground lair, back when they were only sixteen. Had she harbored some inkling of resentment against him this whole time? _No. Not possible._ The room seemed to pulsate with each breath he struggled to take, the walls leaning in. “Now hold on a second—”

“Excuse me!” Anya had sprung up from the narrow hospital bed and pushed between them, one fist tight around a side-tie on her faded gown, looking at Buffy like a con artist appraising her new mark. “I’m sensing a lot of anger here, like you’ve been wronged. And I’m not sure I get the whole story, but I understand that uhm…not having your postmortem wishes respected and carried out to be very upsetting. Do you _wish_ things were…perhaps…different?”

Buffy scoffed, holding up her hands, palms out in the universal sign of “back off”. “I don’t have time for this.”

Xander, too, had just about enough of Anya’s missed-the-mark humor. Unclenching his fingers that wanted to tighten into fists, he spun Anya around by the shoulders and nudged her toward the bed, ignoring her protest. “Anh, maybe you should lie back down.”

Because there were important matters at hand, he couldn’t just let it drop. Grabbing Buffy by the wrist, he pressed, “Speaking of presumptuous, how did you know _we_ were the guilty party behind this evil ploy to resurrect a Slayer? Huh? I’m happy you’re alive, Buffy, but at which point did the trail of evidence begin to point to the loyal Scoobies?”

So maybe he was disappointed when Buffy didn’t even blink. “There’s a… a notebook with the spell, and a sand circle at the Magic Box—it matched the diagram in the notebook. Look, Spike found it, and your names—Willow, Tara, Anya, and you, Xander—were labeled around the diagram.”

Well, that explained a lot. Seemed like a certain vamp’s name always came up whenever things went off-kilter. The rage he’d been suppressing latched onto it as an acceptable focal point, and the intensity made his voice quiver. It boggled his mind that Buffy _still_ refused to see that Spike was not to be trusted. “That’s just perfect! I was wondering when Sir Bleach-a-lot might enter the stage on this little spin-an-evil-tale. You know, I bet this is all part of his grand scheme. Resurrect the Slayer, blame your friends, isolate you, be hero of the hour until you fall into his ready lap. Mighty convenient to accuse the Unconscious Four while we’re laid up all defenseless at Sunnydale Memorial, don’t you think? That’s a new low even for an evil soulless—”

“Wow,” Buffy cut in, clearly not ready to face the facts. “Still singing this old tune about Spike? Only you seem to know a lot about how evil thinks. With zero proof. There’s a witch right here in this room.” He glanced at Tara, who blushed. “And the last time I oh-so-tragically landed in Spike’s lap? It was thanks to a spell done by her girlfriend.”

Automatically, Xander launched into a defense about his best friend. “Willow would never…” Except—he swallowed—Willow… _would_.

“If we would all take a moment to think…” Tara ventured, and he was so taken back by the commanding clarity of her voice that he forgot to argue. “Does anyone remember what we did yesterday? Especially last night?” Her hands fidgeted with the hem of her shirt, rolling and unrolling it, but she held her chin high.

“Well, we… Uhm…” He must’ve gone to work; the boss had been imposing mandatory overtime in an effort to meet the project deadline. Except he couldn’t recall what exactly he _must’ve_ done at work. And afterwards… Afterwards… He rubbed his forehead, then drew a wide arc with his arm, trying to shape air into the elusive memory. It was at the tip of his tongue, but the more Xander tried to grasp it, the more it slipped away, like that wiggling catfish from the one and only time his father had taken him fishing, leaving behind a vague sense of regret and the sharp pain of what could’ve been.

In despair he looked to Anya for help, who, leaning against the bed, was nodding at him encouragingly. “Tell her, Anh! Tell her what we did last night!”

Anya’s eyes widened to saucers, then frantically darted from left to right, as if the right answer was somewhere in the room. “Last night, we uhm…” Suddenly her eyes lit up, as if she’d just spotted a loophole in the fine print of a contract, and her lips curled into a sly smirk. “But I thought I shouldn’t talk about our night activities in public…”

“What I’m trying to say is…” Tara’s voice trembled uncertainly, then resumed when, for a change, nobody else clambered to finish her sentence for her, “We can’t answer you, Buffy. Because…well, we simply don’t remember anything about yesterday. Do we?” She looked to Anya, then Xander, as if daring them to contradict her. While technically correct, that was some twisty logic, proving nothing. Biting his tongue, Xander stubbornly held her gaze. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Anya shrug noncommittally. 

A tentative truce established, Tara approached Buffy, picked up her hands that’d been balled into fists at either side of her body, and enclosed them with her own. As if she hadn’t expected Buffy to be real but now could no longer refute the evidence within her hands, she mumbled, “It would’ve been truly powerful magic… Dark. Dangerous.” Then she shook her head, and spoke more optimistically, “We’ll figure it out. Together. Okay?”

Buffy’s warrior face softened at that, the fierce departing, leaving only sadness behind. A shadow passed over Tara’s eyes as she struggled with her own anguish. “Willow’s still unconscious. Is Dawn all right?”

At the mention of her sister, Buffy relaxed into a smile, tight but genuine. “She’s home. Safe.” She looked like she might add to that, but she only looked down, and a wisp of hair slipped from behind her ear to conceal her eyes.

After a moment of peace, Buffy gently withdrew her hands from Tara to tuck loose strands of her hair behind her ears, visibly pulling herself together. “Look,” she said, but avoided meeting any of their eyes. Stupidly, Xander—in fact, they all—looked at her, as if the understanding they all yearned for was written on her face. “I need to know. Why now? Why am I back? Is there an apocalypse? A disaster on the horizon? Is Glory back?”

He tried to stay mad at her, but his eyes stung at those words. The cold implication was too much: Buffy’s belief that she’d been brought back simply because an apocalypse needed a Slayer; that she was the secret weapon laid to rest after a crisis but reactivated from her grave in an emergency. Yet he had no words of comfort to offer, no reassurance to the contrary. Dumbly, he shook his head.

Denied immediate purpose, Buffy looked deflated. And Xander, for the first time, was struck by how desperate his friend looked, how forlorn, how big of a knucklehead he’d been. This was no way to treat a hero who’d sacrificed herself to protect the world, protect them all. She should’ve been greeted with a freaking parade in front of city hall, a hero’s welcome full of medals and salutes; not interrogated in a standing-room only hospital room in dire need of a fresh coat of paint. He pushed off from the wall. “Hey, Buffy. About what I said—”

“Right, I’d better get back.” Buffy smiled shakily, letting Xander’s words fade into the background unacknowledged. “You should’ve seen Dawn. Hovering over me in full mom mode. I might get grounded if I’m out too long. All of you…get some rest. We’ll catch up later, okay?”

Then, without waiting for a reply, she slipped out the door and disappeared into the hospital hallway, beyond the reach of unvoiced apologies and swallowed regrets.

  


~ To Be Continued... ~ 

* * *

A/N: Thank you for those who have patiently waited for another update and especially those who reached out to me to offer encouragement and support—it's been a tough year. I hope to never leave you hanging like that again! 

Would love to hear your thoughts on this chapter, or just hear from you in general. Hope life has been treating you well. *hugs*


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